


Stranger Things Have Happened

by LiselleVelvet



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Developing Relationships, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse (canon), M/M, Slow Build, potential trigger warnings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-02
Updated: 2015-10-27
Packaged: 2018-04-18 17:56:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 31,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4715138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LiselleVelvet/pseuds/LiselleVelvet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One of these days Barry’s tendency to trust his instincts was going to come back to haunt him.  When Captain Cold tracks him down to ask a favor he feels compelled to agree, or at least hear the guy out.  His life is about to get a lot more complicated.</p><p>Canon (mostly) compliant through the end of Season 1, with the assumption that closing the singularity meant Barry had to go back in time just long enough to prevent Eddie's death.</p><p>CURRENTLY ON HIATUS. Nemeses is being much more insistent and I can't really juggle both of them at once. However, this is not abandoned and I will pick it back up as I get more used to the whole creative writing thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Unexpected Houseguests

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, I'm posting. No idea how long this will end up being, but I hope you enjoy the ride. Hoping that no one seems to out of character, and would love to hear your thoughts!
> 
> More tags added as they become relevant and I get the hang of this thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edited! for content and grammar and things

Barry had no idea how he continued to end up in these situations. In a back alley with an armful of his supervillain? Nemesis? He still wasn’t sure what category Cold fit into and that was before the hugging. Maybe one of these days he’d try that whole ‘planning ahead’ thing that Oliver kept going on about.

It started that morning during his coffee run, about 30 hours into his typical 8-hour shift.  A new mob war sprung up over the last week and it was all hands on deck and then some at the precinct.  Barry just managed to wrangle a quick break to refuel and stock up on caffeine from Singh, and Cold just had to ambush him outside the back door to Jitters. All he got out of the man was “I have a problem, Scarlet,” and they set up a time to meet after Barry’s shift ended.  Normally he would’ve argued more, demanded more information...basically done anything other than what he did. Which was agree and allow Snart to choose both the time and place.  Something seemed very...off about his nemesis and Barry wanted to know why.

He actually managed to be on time.  Mostly.  About a minute and a half late and Snart made no comment whatsoever.  Confirmation that something was very wrong, check.  He zipped from the precinct to the Lab to drop off his stuff and put on the suit—never hurt to be careful, but he didn’t think he’d be walking into an ambush. He texted Caitlin and Cisco about his run-in with Cold during his lunch break and they came up with a Plan B in case it was an elaborate trap after all. The other two weren’t in favor of his impulsive decision to meet the man but promised to reserve judgement, and run interference with Joe that evening if the detective decided to go by the Lab on his way home. Barry seriously hoped that Joe’d just go home, they had a very long couple of days. Also, Caitlin and Cisco weren’t that good at lying.

Barry moved closer, waited for the other man to speak up, explain himself, do something beyond stand there slightly hunched over and curled in on himself. He was breathing heavily and if Barry didn’t know better he’d think Cold was on the verge of a panic attack. Ok, whatever this was had to be pretty damn serious to get the normally cool, ugh, Barry can’t believe he walked into a pun in his own mind, man into such a state?

It probably wasn’t metahuman related–if that was the case he would’ve freaked out a bit during the betrayal at Ferris Air rather than having fun at Barry’s expense. Besides, there weren’t any new metahumans on STAR Labs’ radar, and Barry hadn’t seen anything at CCPD to indicate that either Lisa or Rory had any warrants. Well, any _new_ active warrants anyway, or hospital reports that fit their description.

Barry continued to close the distance between them, looked around to make sure the area was as deserted as it first appeared. He pulled his cowl down, then let his arms drop to his sides, slightly extended with the palms up in a classic ‘no-threat’ posture.  Cold lets him approach, eyes wary but still, and Barry couldn’t quite believe it, but...fearful.  As he got closer he saw just how wrecked the other man was—eyes bloodshot, huge circles under them, expression brittle and on edge—and he couldn’t help it, just pulled Snart into a tight hug.

The thief stiffened for a heartbeat before practically collapsing onto the younger man, dropped his forehead onto Barry’s shoulder and returning the embrace, arms tight around Barry’s chest and _damn_ was the man strong. He had no idea how much time went by before Snart drew in a deep, shaky breath and pulled back a bit, loosened his grip from ‘lung-crushing’ to ‘really tight by normal standards’. “My father, he’s out.”

Barry blinked, confused.  That was really not enough…oooh, right.  He remembered now, looking through the book of mugshots after their first encounter.  Joe mentioned that his father was a dirty cop doing time in Iron Heights. Well…that provided a little context, but still not enough.  Unless…shit. He really regretted destroying Snart’s files now, because maybe then he’d have more information. Or that he read the damn things before running Felicity’s program.  He waited, hoping the other would continue without prompting.  He didn’t exactly have anywhere he needed to be tonight.

* * *

 

He may have all night, but patience has never been one of Barry’s strong suits, and becoming the Flash only made that worse. After waiting a few more minutes, he decided to nudge the conversation along. “That may be an explanation for some people, but I’m gonna need more than that, Cold.”

The older man took a long, shaky breath before releasing the speedster and stepping back, creating some distance.  Pulling himself together, if only just a little.  He seemed to need the space before he could elaborate.

“Thought you might get it. Yours is there too,” he trailed off slightly, adding “but you actually visit your father, so maybe not,” under his breath.

It took a moment, but Barry caught on.  Of course Snart knew about his Dad.  Wait.

“How do you know I visit?” came out before he could stop himself, wanting to know but needing to focus now that Cold was actually talking.

His mask slipped—clearly revealing more to Barry than he intended and not quite sure how to recover.  The speedster made a mental note to follow up on this later before giving the man an out.

“Look, we can come back to that.  Joe mentioned something a while ago, that your dad was a dirty cop and doing time in Iron Heights?  But that’s about it.” And it certainly didn’t explain why Snart was here, approaching Barry for help.  Clearly upset, and so far off his game he was almost unrecognizable.  Even the stupid parka was missing.  The thief was in street clothes—a dark grey long-sleeved shirt and jeans—making it obvious that he didn’t have the cold gun with him for this meeting, either.

“Not gonna go into too many details.  Lisa’s the main reason the old man did time in the first place.  Swearing he’d get her when he got out is why he never got parole.  That and the dirty cop bit. You badges hate that more than most things. I’m,” he grimaced, clearly not liking what he was about to say, to reveal to his...whatever he considered Barry. “Not sure I can keep her safe.” Scowled, muttered “either of us, really.”

Barry was almost positive he wasn’t supposed to hear the last part, but it was hard not to with barely a foot separating them.  He didn’t know how to react to that.  Cold may be many things, have many less-than admirable traits, but one thing Barry took for granted—practically as an unwritten rule—was the man’s ability to look out for himself.  To turn practically any situation to his advantage.  It was one of his more annoying qualities, if the speedster was being honest with himself. That and his dedication to his sister.  Maybe Heat Wave, too. Ok, so two things then.

Yet here he was, coming to Barry for help with both of those things. “So what exactly are you asking of me, Snart?”

The man winced slightly at the use of his last name. It was barely perceptible, something Barry would’ve missed if they were standing further apart.  Or if he wasn’t studying the thief’s face so intently.  Snart sighed again, shoving his hands in his pockets before responding. “Honestly Red, I dunno. Still can’t quite believe this is happening.  But maybe find her someplace safe to lay low while I deal with the bastard?  Can’t be connected to either of us or our usual line of work.  He’d know to look there. Already tracked us down once.”

Barry’s mind was racing.  STAR Labs had the space, but he had to talk to the others before offering it as a solution.  Plus, they’d have to Rogue-proof it.  He knew there was no way that Cold, and probably Heat Wave, would be far from Lisa given the circumstances.  That meant two, potentially three, people living in close quarters with his friends. Who were kidnapped and tormented by the people that now needed their help. How did he end up in these situations?

“Ok I may have a pretty good option in mind, but need to run it by the others first. Pass me your phone?”  That earned him a curious glance—finally an expression he expected from the other man—as he dug out his phone and passed it to Barry.  The speedster quickly entered his number and sent himself a text before handing the phone back.

“Care to return the gesture, Barry?” the other man asked.

Barry smirked and gestured to his suit, “Does it look like I can fit my phone in this thing, Cold?” earning him that considering head-tilt and once-over that Barry was sure lingered more than necessary.

“Fair point. I assume you mean STAR Labs.  Don’t bother answering—we both know that’s what you meant.  Let Ramon and Snow know that we will respect any boundaries set.  Within reason.  And that pipeline, Red?  Not reasonable.”

That hadn’t even crossed his mind.  The pipeline solution never sat easily with him and he was actually secretly glad the other sabotaged the transfer to Lian Yu and freed the metas. Once the sting of betrayal and Mardon’s lightning wore off, anyway.  Barry just rolled his eyes a bit at that. “Never thought it was, Cold. Anything else before I run?”

“Not really. You lot decide to help that’ll change but…” he trailed off.

Barry could respect that, didn’t want to pry. He always hated it when others tried to make him open up about what happened with his Mom and Dad...who was now probably stuck in prison forever because of Wells, Thawne, whatever. Barry gave himself a mental shake.

“Ok, let me get back and fill them in. I’ll be in touch soon, one way or the other.” It was odd, feeling the need to extend common courtesy to his nemesis, but that summed up his life since the lightning and Barry just rolled with it.

Cold nodded once with a quiet “Thanks, Scarlet,” that lingered in Barry’s ears all the way back to the Cortex.

* * *

 

Turned out it that wasn’t just Caitlin and Cisco in the Lab, Iris arrived while he was out talking to Snart. She was dropping by more frequently lately, ever since finding out about the Flash and helping them take down Grodd.  Well, helping him get away from Grodd more or less in one piece.  She was becoming an invaluable addition to the team. His best friend was more grounded and practical than either himself or Cisco, but not quite as cautious as Caitlin when it came to taking risks.  Joe wasn’t too thrilled, but seemed to be coming to terms with it.  At least this time he didn’t pull out the silent treatment.  Barry hoped that they all learned something from the whole ‘keeping Iris in the dark about the Flash’ fiasco, but figured it was only a matter of time before one of them did something.

Hell, if all this worked out he’d probably be on the receiving end of the patented West freeze-out this time.  And did he really just think of having the Snarts, and Rory, stay at STAR for an indeterminate length of time as ‘working out’?!  Barry refused to look at that too closely, especially since the others fixed him with expectant gazes when he dropped back to normal speed.

“Well man, what did Cold want?” Cisco got straight to the point, kicking his chair out from behind his workstation. Iris raised an eyebrow, leaning on the railing and giving him that ‘talk, Bear’ look of hers while Caitlin just stood up and crossed her arms.

He pushed the cowl down, taking a second to collect his thoughts. Trying to wrap his own head around everything that happened in the last—was it really only twenty minutes?—so he could lay it out for his team.  But first, “Cisco, can you pull up the files on Snart’s father? Thanks.”

The engineer nodded skeptically before rolling back to his keyboard and starting to pull up the information. “May take me a few minutes, I’m not as fast as Felicity.”

“That’s fine, just have a feeling we’re gonna want to look them over soon enough.”

That earned him some weird looks.  He took a deep breath before launching into an edited version of the meeting, leaving out the hugging and panic attack.  If that was even what it was, Barry still wasn’t sure.  Stressing how out of character the entire thing was for Cold. Actually showing emotions beyond the usual sardonic amusement, typically at their expense, not being able to maintain his persona.  The real fear for his sister, and finally what the man asked of them and Barry’s tentative solution.

Their reactions were fairly predictable, although he appreciated them waiting until he finished before starting in. Cisco was still bitter about Cold sabotaging his tech on the transport and Caitlin wasn’t a fan of either of them. Iris stayed quiet, considering. Barry sighed.

“Aren’t we supposed to be the good guys here? Shouldn’t we at least consider helping?” That got Caitlin to budge slightly, her expression softening. Just a little, but enough to notice.

“Hey Cisco, have you gotten those files on Snart the Elder up yet?” Iris entered the conversation.

“What? Oh, yeah. Barry, you should choose a harder password, man.”

Barry chose to ignore that and all of them moved behind Cisco to see what he found.

Well shit. This does explain some of why Snart—Cold—looked so off. And he was really going to have to come up with a new name for the guy before this got very confusing. Focus, dammit. The files were disturbing to say the least, and—

“Damn.  Ultimately convicted of working for organized crime, you don’t get that much time for simply taking bribes, but clearly they couldn’t prove anything more serious.  Or they didn’t look.  And since he was a cop, I bet they ignored a lot of the signs before they began building their case.  Dad mentioned that this reprimand usually means ‘showed up to work drunk, repeatedly’.”  She was frowning now, concerned and seemed to be getting on-board with this crazy request.

He could’ve hugged her, but that would’ve required way too many explanations for why helping Snart mattered to him. The speedster didn’t have any answers, just knew that for some reason he really wanted to do this.  Learning their father was a drunk only solidified that.  Between his time as a CSI and the things Joe told him and Iris growing up about alcohol-related violence, he was starting to assemble a picture from the clues available. Combine that with Cold’s demeanor, and what he came up with wasn’t pretty.

Cisco and Caitlin glanced between him and Iris.

“Ok, fine. So what parts of the Lab will be easiest to lock down for the Rogues to use?” Caitlin directed that to Cisco, prodding the engineer into action and pulling up the blueprints.

“Seriously, we’re doing this?” Cisco shot them all an incredulous look.

Barry ran his hands through his hair, then rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah.  We may not like them, but the Rogues aren’t too bad.  Mostly annoying.  They’ve respected the rules from the woods and I wouldn’t be too surprised if they’re helping to keep crime down by making others fall in line.  And Cold did not look good.  Like, at all.  He also said they’d respect any ground rules we set about the Lab as long as they didn’t involve the pipeline. Why don’t we take another half hour, forty-five minutes or so getting a section of the lab locked down for them, then I’ll call Cold and let him know what’s going on?”

It took a while to decide on a section that was near the Cortex, had direct access to the garages, and could be locked down.  They settled on a section of the main floor that terminated into their lounge because it had a full kitchen in addition to the sofas and TV.  The rest of the area included four labs that could easily convert into bedrooms, and locker-room style bathing facilities.  Cisco reactivated the pass-code system on the doors, updating the team’s proximity cards and Barry’s suit before he started in on passes for the Rogues, making sure they had a path from the garage while keeping them out of Team Flash’s work space.  

Sharing the lounge wasn’t ideal, but it wasn’t the end of the world.  They wanted to give the Rogues space, but decided they’d rather not have the supervillains on a separate floor.  The whole area was covered by surveillance cameras, minus the showers, allowing them to keep an eye on their guests.

After Cisco finished with the doors, Barry texted Cold to let him know the Lab would work after all.   Putting the phone back down, he zipped around to gather blankets, extra couches, towels, and the ubiquitous STAR Labs sweats and shirts for their...guests? Enemies? Soon-to-be-resident supervillains? He snickered at the last. Considering who their mentor turned out to be, it just wasn’t STAR Labs without a supervillain in residence.  He and his friends had no idea what the Rogues would bring with so he wanted to at least make sure that they could shower and wouldn’t have to sleep in their street clothes.

Iris and Caitlin were in the lounge, shifting the couches Barry brought and checking on supplies. “Bear, we’re gonna need to stock this place better, and soon.”

Right, groceries...well, they’d have to make do for tonight.  There was a frozen pizza, some bananas, and half a box of granola bars.  As long as Barry stuck to Cisco’s Flash food, that is. Luckily, he had tomorrow off and could iron out the finer details of this whole mess.  And get food. It wasn’t like he had plans anyway, beyond sleeping in.  Which probably wouldn’t happen, especially since he and Cisco were going to spend the night in the Lab, just in case.

Now they just needed their ‘guests’ to arrive.


	2. STAR Labs Sleepover

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updated and edited for content, grammar and clarity. Many thanks to the lovely [ Aunt Crimson](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Crimson1/pseuds/Crimson1) and [Liu](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Liu/pseuds/Liu) for their help!

Waiting sucked, it just gave him time to reflect.  Not that Barry was awake enough to do more than go in circles.  He still wasn’t sure why they were doing this, why he wanted to, why he cared at all.  But here he was in the Flash suit, cowl down, resisting the urge to pace.  There was also the secret identity issue to consider; was he really ok with more of his enemies knowing who he was?  Even though the Flash suit was comfortable, Barry did not intend to sleep in it.  

On the plus side, Cold honored their agreement so far and that made him a bit less apprehensive about letting Glider and Heat Wave in on the secret.  He was sure the pyromaniac would be there alongside the Snarts, even if Cisco wasn’t convinced.  He decided the cowl was staying up until the Rogues agreed to the terms he and his friends refused to budge on—the only things that would force Barry to turn them away.  If he had to do that, better they not know who he was.  

Or have his identity confirmed, because Barry found it hard to believe that Snart hadn’t told his sister.  But enough of that, they were here, rumbling into view on the surveillance feed at the main gate. Barry pulled up his cowl and zipped out to meet them.  Heh, Rory was here—too bad he and Cisco hadn’t made that bet after all.  Their movements were efficient, only waiting until there was enough space to squeeze through before driving forward.  Glider clung to her brother, leather jacket scuffed and dirty, typical outrageous heels traded for low work boots.  

The speedster couldn’t help compare this to their last interaction...well, his last interactions with them as a group.  The casual confidence and swagger expected from the Rogues was gone, replaced by wariness and tension.  Snart continued into the lab complex, clearly remembering the route from the last time he was here.  Rory followed close behind, practically herding the others forward into the shelter of the garage.  

Barry leaned against the door the Rogues would have access to and waited.  Snart reached him first, removing his helmet and tucking it under his arm, some of the tension leaving his shoulders.

“You gonna keep that on the whole time, Scarlet?” nodding to the cowl.  

Ah, the drawl was back. Not at usual strength, but better than before.  Barry rolled his eyes, trying to bite back his smile at the sardonic tone and infuriating nickname.  Banter was familiar, hearing it restored some balance after their encounter two hours earlier.  Had it really just been two hours?  Comforting the older man was still throwing him for a loop, it was a relief to see his sense of humor make an appearance.

“It’s fine for now. You three all set down here?” he asked, waiting for acknowledgement before leading his sometimes-villains into STAR Labs.  It was weird to see them in street clothes, but had to admit that their Rogue gear was pretty conspicuous.  They didn’t have the guns with them; Cisco would be disappointed, but Barry was a bit relieved. One less thing to deal with tonight.

It was a good thing they tracked down STAR Labs sweats during their preparations.  Aside from the small duffel bag Glider had over her shoulder, the Rogues had nothing with them.  Between the noticeable lack of supplies, obvious tension, apparent injuries on Glider —including a large cut over her eye—and Heat Wave’s guarding stance, Barry knew they made the right call letting the Rogues hide out at STAR Labs.He just hoped that they agreed to the terms Team Flash would lay out without too much of an argument.  Key words being ‘too much,’ Barry was sure they’d balk a bit.

However, if they accepted the conditions it would give Barry and his friends a sense of just how serious a mess this was without needing the details.  Hopefully they’d be able to avoid, or at least postpone the pissing match between Snart and Cisco over the guns, or getting Heat Wave all fired up—Barry groaned internally, he had to stop walking into these damn puns—or letting Lisa and Caitlin start baiting each other. Although Lisa didn’t really look like she was in any condition to provoke Caitlin.  

All he wanted was to avoid a complete disaster and finally get some sleep because the siblings looked about as exhausted as Barry felt.  He’d been awake for forty-six of the last forty-eight hours and _really_ needed to crash.  

He flashed into position when they got close, standing between Iris and Cisco to present a united front.  Snart looked surprised to see Iris, slightly more wary than he was in the hall.

“Is your father here as well, Miss West?” Of course he knew who she was.  He and Cold needed to have a long talk about how the thief knew this stuff, but now was not the time.

Iris took the lead, calmly meeting the Rogues’ gaze and staying focused on the non-negotiables—everything else could wait.  “Welcome to STAR Labs. I think we’d all like to keep this part short and iron out the details after some sleep.”  She paused to look each of them in the eye.  “You have access to this room, the path you took up from the garage, and the lab suite through that door.  Cisco’s making proximity passes for each of you to come and go in that area as you please.  There’s also a locker set up for your guns.   It’s not exactly relevant tonight, but the weapons will remain in the locker while you’re staying here.” She gave each of them a hard look.  Barry was impressed.  He doubted the lack of arguments would last very long but he’d take it for now.  “Are we all in agreement?”

Rory’s expression darkened, but before he could get started Cold shot him a quick, hard look and spoke for the group. “Yes, thank you. Until morning?” A slight lilt turned that into a question.

Barry nodded, stepping forward. “Yeah, those were the main things.  We can deal with the rest of this later,” waving his hand to incorporate the entire weird situation.  Lisa in particular looked like she needed to crash.  The speedster deliberately pushed the cowl down, moving towards the door to their new home for…however long this lasts. “Lemme show you around.  See you tomorrow Caitlin, Iris.”

“Night Bear, I’ll cover for you with Dad.”  He returned her one-armed hug and shot her a grateful smile, not ready to bring Joe into this quite yet.

“Wait.  Do you want me to take a look at that?” Caitlin asked, gesturing to Glider’s cut before looking her over more carefully.  “Or any of your other injuries?”  

The siblings exchanged a glance.  

“Tomorrow, instead?  We cleaned everything pretty well, and...”  Lisa trailed off, eyes lingering on the blankets and couches haphazardly set up in the lounge.  

Caitlin gave her a tentative smile, nodded to all of them and followed Iris out.  “Tomorrow, then.”  

“You two staying?” Rory asked the room at large, but the speedster knew what he meant.

“Yeah, someone’s gotta make sure you follow the agreement for at least one night.”  Cisco chimed in, never looking up from his tablet.  

Barry squeezed his eyes shut, hoping none of the Rogues would rise to the bait.  They didn’t and he quickly lead them to their new home to forestall any more bickering, both Snarts at his heels.  Rory followed after shooting Cisco another glare, not that it had any effect.  The engineer never noticed, completely focused on the security passes he was busy creating for the criminals.

“Ok, we didn’t exactly have much notice so it’s couches in the lounge for tonight.  But these labs are empty and could easily convert to living space while you’re here,” he gestured to the four doorways they’d passed in the hall.  “Bathrooms and showers are here at the end—locker room style, sorry, but better than decontamination showers.  We weren’t sure if you’d have stuff for tonight...there are towels and a change of clothes for each of you in there.”  He peered at the fire starter.  “The shirt may not work for you, I’ll see if I can find a bigger one. Meet us back in the lounge when you’re done.”

“No prox passes yet, Barry.”  Of course Cold would be the one to use his name first. He just rolled his eyes—seemed to be doing that a lot tonight.

“You don’t need them in here and I’ll prop the lounge door open for you just in case. Cisco’s putting the final touches on everything now; he just wanted to update the sensors in the suit first.”  Barry turned to go as Golden Glider and Heat Wave entered the shower area. Captain Cold caught his arm, meeting his curious gaze.

“Thank you, Barry.” It was quiet, direct, and sincere. Something he thought the other man practically incapable of before tonight.

“You’re welcome, see you in a few.”  And with that he took off, finding a tee that had a better chance of fitting Heat Wave before hitting up the shower suite off the Cortex.  He was glad to get out of the Flash suit and into non-work clothes.  Barry donned his soft red tee and dark gray sweatpants—not STAR Labs for once—and went back to the lounge to wait, sprawling across one of the couches.  Surprisingly Lisa was the first of the Rogues to reappear, perhaps by design.

Her eyes flicked between Barry, Cisco, and back again. “I remember you now, from the bar.”

He nodded, getting up and moving towards the kitchen area. “Yeah, that was me.”  Barry shot his friend a glance—yup, blushing even though his eyes never left the tablet—before addressing Lisa again.  “You hungry?  Or think the others will be?  We don’t have a lot on hand right now but there’s frozen pizza and some granola bars.  We’ll make a grocery list and stock up tomorrow.”

She nodded, joining him by the counter.  Looking all kinds of odd in the STAR Labs gear and far more subdued than they’d ever seen her.  After looking through the meager options, she pulled out the pizza.  Barry put the oven on before grabbing glasses and plates out of the proper cabinets and setting them out on the coffee table nearby.

The other Rogues reappeared as the oven finished preheating.  Lisa put the pizza in before getting a glass of water and claiming a spot on the couch nearest Cisco.  That figured.  Barry tossed her a blanket.

“That may fit you better,” he addressed Heat Wave, looking between the man and the shirt draped over the back of the couch nearest the lab suite.  He got a grunt and a nod for his effort.  Barry nodded back.  

None of them seemed to know what to do or say, the oven loud in the otherwise silent space.  He fidgeted.  Heat Wave sprawled out on the couch and seemed to fall asleep almost immediately.  Cold was still on edge, crossed the room to sit next to his sister, an arm around her shoulder.  She let out a shaky breath, leaning into his side.

Barry’s stomach growled and he grimaced.  Between lack of sleep and his interminable shift at CCPD he hadn’t consumed anywhere near the number of calories he needed for the day.  The recent spike in mob activity caught everyone by surprise and kept the entire precinct racking up overtime.  He started his shift at an armed robbery—jewelry store on the outskirts of Santini turf—that he barely finished processing before he, Joe and Eddie had to go to an attempted triple murder in the heart of Darbinyan territory.  That was a mess, took him and his colleagues the better part of 18 hours to process.  As they were winding down at that crime scene, Joe and Eddie were called away yet again to oversee a building collapse further into the warehouse district.  Thankfully, Singh hadn’t sent him along on that call, too.  His boss ordered him to finish collecting evidence at the nearly-triple, then go home and get rest.  He even took Barry off call, wanting him ‘rested and _on time_ Monday morning, Allen.’  

There was no way a slice of pizza would help...or even the entire pie.  Barry flashed out of the room to grab a handful of the calorie bars Cisco and Caitlin made for him from the stash in the treadmill room.  He could see Cold’s eyes trying to follow him as he came back to normal speed in the lounge.

The thief’s eyes narrowed, “How did you—?”

Saved by the oven timer.  He really needed to remember the Rogues were there before using his powers because he did not need to give his nemeses any more information on the Flash than they already had.  But since they already knew about his speed, zipping around was a different story.  He had the pizza sliced and back on the coffee table next to the plates before the timer registered that it had been turned off.  Another blink and the first slice was next to Cisco on the arm of the couch. He and the engineer turned that into a game—whenever food timers went off, Cisco would start to reach down towards the nearest surface and Barry would zip food into place before his hand dropped.

So far, Cisco only won once, and yes, Caitlin, it _was_ amazing what one comes up with when bored.  This time Barry was the clear winner and his friend waved the slice at him in thanks.  He sprawled onto the nearest unoccupied sofa with his own piece and two of the calorie bars.  The bars went first, at just shy of superspeed, and he made a face. “Man, we have _got_ to work on making these things taste better.  Or just like something other than paste.”  Barry gulped down half his water before slowly starting in on the pizza.

“Ray and Caitlin are working on it, she mentioned they’re pretty close to something we can mix into normal food to add calories.  Then you’d just need those for emergencies.”  Cisco responded, clearly distracted.  “Hah! Got it! Lemme go get the passes.”

Oh shit. How had he forgotten about the Rogues so soon!?  Barry looked around to see all three of them staring at him.  The brunette barely resisted the urge to facepalm, setting for rubbing the back of his neck instead.  Ah well…he sighed, just giving up.  “Ask away.”

Rory snorted, shaking his head. “Kid, we’ll never get any sleep if you let him do that.”  

Cold shot his partner a glare, slowly chewing, clearly trying to figure out what to ask first.

Thankfully, Cisco burst back into the lounge before the man could start in with the questions, passes in hand.  And…wow.  Barry had to shake his head at his friend.  They were themed.  Of course they were themed.  He couldn’t contain a disbelieving laugh.  

Cisco shot him a wounded look, moving to hand them out.  “Glider…Heat Wave…and here, Cold.”

The latter took one look at his pass before he snickered, catching Barry’s eye and sharing a look.  Apparently, they shared looks now.  Not that he could blame the man.  Cisco, unsurprisingly, went above and beyond.

“As much as I love the alias, Cisco, don’t you think that’ll get tedious before too long?” Lisa verbalized what Barry had been thinking practically the entire evening. “Especially since my brother still refuses to give us your name, Flash.”  

Actually, Cold outed him not that long ago...maybe she missed it? That wasn’t likely—Barry gave himself an internal shake and decided to let it go.  He smiled, extending a hand to Lisa. “Barry Allen.”

She shook his hand, returning his smile with one of her own. “And while my brother is completely committed to his persona, setting up even more cold puns is a health hazard.” She shot the man in question a look.

He rolled his eyes at her. “Len works.”

Barry raised an eyebrow, “Not Leonard?”

Len’s eyes narrowed, “Sure, Bartholomew.”

Lisa and Cisco snickered as Barry winced. “Fair point.”

“Great, now that we all know names, how ‘bout sleeping?” Rory glared around the room, moving to put his plate in the dishwasher and refilling his glass of water before moving back to the couch he claimed earlier, snagging a blanket from the stack on the table. He flopped back down with his back to the rest of the room and seemed to fall asleep as soon as the blanket was in place.  

Sn-Len—and that was going to take some getting used to—shook his head at his friend before getting to his feet, his and Lisa’s plates stacked neatly in one hand.  “Here Kid.”  Barry gave him a confused look before realizing with the other meant and passing Cold his plate. “You too, Cisco?”

“Thanks, man.”

Cold put the dishes in the dishwasher alongside Heat Wave’s while Lisa took care of the trash.  Who knew the Rogues were such tidy guests?

“Any chance for some toothbrushes?”

“Crap, knew we forgot something.”  Cisco and Barry shared a look before he zipped off, raiding Joe’s stash, careful not to slow down in case his foster father was still awake.  He put the supplies down on the table as he dropped back to normal speed, noticing how Cold and Glider tried to follow his movement.  It was kind of nice to be around people that knew about his powers but hadn’t seen him in action outside a fight.  Flattering a little, even.

“Convenient.  Back shortly.”

He and Cisco took care of their own nightly rituals before settling in, claiming the two couches closest to the Cortex.  Cisco crashed nearly as fast as Heat Wave, but Barry was still buzzing with energy.  His thoughts were racing, trying to make sense of the last few hours. Which kinda sucked because he was exhausted, mentally and physically.    

Lisa and Cold, Barry he still could not wrap his head around calling the other man ‘Len’, returned.  This time Lisa settled into the couch next to Rory, her brother taking the one in the middle, acting as guards.  It wasn’t necessary here in the Lab, but he understood the instinct.  Especially since the speedster was certain she had a close call recently.  Her injuries made a compelling case, and that was the only scenario Barry could come up with to explain the Rogues _here._  In STAR Labs.  Settling into couches in the lounge.  

He watched as Sn-Len dammit, covered her with two of the blankets and squeezed her shoulder before grabbing one for himself and practically falling into the couch next to Barry’s.  The man looked exhausted.  “Where’s the lights, Red?”

Getting them himself seemed the faster option, hitting the main switches before settling back under his own blanket, head by Cold.

“Thanks for not asking, Scarlet,” he murmured.

“This has to be some kind of record or something,” he shot the older man a smile.  “Don’t thank me yet.  We will be asking tomorrow.  In detail.  Just no sense of pressing tonight.”  He heard a sigh and the sounds of the other man settling in.  “But if you want to talk, I’m here.” He wasn’t sure why he offered, perhaps because he can’t stop thinking about the first part of their meeting.  His nemesis just barely holding it together, latching onto Barry so hard he could still feel his arms around his chest.

“Some other time.  Maybe.  Tired, won’t sleep if I think about it anymore today.”

He nodded, not that his nemesis could see him.  “Offer’s open. I mean it.”

“Mmm. Night.”

“G’night.”


	3. Breakfast of Champions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The morning after and the beginning of context.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to the lovely [ Aunt Crimson](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Crimson1/pseuds/Crimson1) and [Liu](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Liu/pseuds/Liu) for their continuing help, any remaining errors and typos are my own (and please let me know when you find them)! Hope you guys enjoy--the next chapter will probably take a little longer because I don't have a handle on Joe's voice yet but anyway, here's the next installment :)

Len woke with a start, going from a dead sleep to fully alert in a heartbeat.  Reaching for the cold gun he didn’t have with him and rolling to the floor on his knees, taking up a defensive position.  Someone’s phone was going off, but he didn’t recognize the ringtone.  Heart racing, Len took stock of his surroundings before slowly letting out the breath he didn’t realize he was holding.  Right.  This was S.T.A.R. Labs.  He got back onto the couch, glad no one witnessed his overreaction. They were safe.  

That thought caught him by surprise, unsure when he placed so much trust in the Flash, his nemesis.  The kid he screwed over not all that long ago.  But he did—knew he, his sister, and his best friend did not have to worry about the do-gooders selling them out.  

The ringing stopped, followed by a bang and a quiet ‘ow fuck,’ then “Lo, Iris.  Time’sit?”  a pause, then “For real? one sec.”

Len watched the kid zoom _through_ the door.  But that wasn’t possible, right?  He could see Barry Allen through the large glass window, pacing—did the kid ever sit still?—and running a hand through his sleep-flattened hair.  Must’ve felt Len’s gaze, because he turned and met his eyes through the window.  Half a blink later and the kid was in front of him again, whispering.  

“Morning.  Iris and Joe are gonna head this way, be here in about an hour.  How do you guys like your bagels?”

Fuck, West this soon?  He barely managed to resist the urge to scowl.  Wait, bagels? Apparently the question must’ve shown on his face, because Red quickly elaborated.  

“They’re hitting up Bagelman on their way over here.  We don’t exactly have much for breakfast, so what do you three want?”  

“West is offering to get us breakfast?”  What kind of weird alternate dimension did he wake up in?  But the brunette was still on the phone, needed an answer. “Never mind.  Mick will take a sausage, egg, and cheese on poppy, extra sausage.  I’ll take one on sesame, and Lisa will want cranberry or blueberry, toasted with peanut butter.” That last part earned him an odd look, not that he blamed the younger man.  Len had no idea how Lisa liked that combination either.  Especially since toasted bagel meant melty peanut butter, but to each their own.  

He tried to follow the kid’s movement as he zipped back out of the room, with limited success.  But the thief was even more certain that the door never opened.  Yet, Barry was clearly on the other side.  How is that even possible?  

Mick’s voice interrupted his thoughts.  “Hey Buddy, wassat ab’t?”

“West wanted our breakfast order, apparently.”

A grunt, then “‘Kay.”  

“Quiet.  Sleeping, dammit,” drifted out from the pile of blankets covering Ramon.  Len suppressed a snort at that.  Lisa hadn’t shown any signs of stirring yet, probably a good thing considering how yesterday went.  

Yesterday…This time he couldn’t hold it back, glad no one was aware enough to see him shudder.  Feeling his heart rate spiking, remembering.  Pulling up to their latest safe house—one of the more obscure ones since getting the news about their father—to tell Lisa about the meeting he set with Flash for that evening.  Only to find the place wasn’t there.  Reduced to a pile of rubble, smoke starting to rise from the wreckage—something caught fire, power lines sparked it.  Probably.  Glad, after his complaining, that the place lacked a gas stove.  Racing forward, calling her phone, shouting, hoping.  Hoping she had the ringer on for once—there!  Spotted movement.  Tearing through the debris, hands torn up, bleeding.  Smoke getting stronger.  Sirens now, too.  Grabbing her hand.  Conscious, hurt but not too bad, but stuck.  Pinned.  The two of them finally getting that beam off her, then away.  Her gun left behind somewhere in the debris, along with everything else.  Racing across town-

Shit.  He rubbed both hands over his face, wincing.  Len stared down at them, trying to get rid of the image of Lisa’s hand reaching out from under half a house.  The gut-wrenching moment when he thought she was…He swallowed.  Shook his head, hoping to banish the smell of smoke and gas.  His bone-deep fear.  The panic.  Not that it helped.  Both hands were torn up from the search, a constant reminder of what happened.  They’d gotten the glass and dirt out at Mick’s place, and nothing looked obviously infected.  Small mercies.  Maybe Dr. Snow would be willing to take a look sometime today, just in case.  One of the cuts on his palm was deep and probably could use stitches, not just the butterfly bandages they had access to.

At least he and Mick still had their guns, hidden in one of Mick’s workshops.  Neither liked the idea of leaving them behind overnight, but Mick conceded that they needed somewhere safe to crash and not having the guns with them would speed that process along.  Hopefully, he could convince Red to do that Flash-fetch thing again like with the toothbrushes.  Maybe even bring Len along for the ride. As much as he hated the idea of giving up some of their locations to the so-called heroes and turning over the guns, it was better than anyone else getting their hands on the weapons.  Or risking Lisa’s life again by going out of the lab so soon.  He doubted Scarlet would put up more than a token argument, probably only about bringing Len along on the run, and the thief intended to turn the guns over as soon as they get back to the lab. To Cisco, unless he missed his guess. The engineer was very attached to his creations—noticed that when he re-created the guns all those months ago.  

He wanted to punch something.  Wished he knew how the bastard tracked them down so fast.  The old man only got out a few days earlier and they’d been _careful_ after Len got the news.  Someone must’ve ratted them out, provided at least enough starting information to lead the old man to the safe house.  And there was no doubt their father was behind it.  Not after the threats he made when Lisa testified.

That’s why he went to the Flash in the first place—the scientists and Mick were the only ones he was certain didn’t provide the information.  And his ongoing partnership with the pyromaniac wasn’t exactly secret.  Anything Mick had set up wasn’t safe either.  Not in the long term.

Barry came back into the room at normal speed this time, the sound of the door jolting Len from his thoughts.  The kid poked Cisco until the engineer grumbled and pulled the blanket away from his face. “Wha?”

“You good if I run home for about 20 to change and pick up their stuff?  Iris and Joe should be here in about an hour with breakfast, got you your usual.  Sounded like he knows a bit more about what happened...not that CCPD connected anything back to Glider yet...but he sounded _way_ less pissed than I expected.  Want me to grab you some clothes on my way back?”  

“Hmm?  Sure.  Fine.  Sounds good.  Go ‘way an’ lemme sleep ‘til you get back, man.”

The kid smothered a laugh at his friend before disappearing in a whirlwind of yellow lightning—something Len doubted he’d ever tire of seeing.  He settled back into the couch, also content to wait for the speedster’s return before getting up.  Though he did set his internal clock, just in case, before turning Barry’s words over in his head.

It was certainly possible that the detective was one of the cops called to the scene, but then why didn’t Red have the same details?  He thought the CSI always worked on cases assigned to his foster-father.  That was what his research, not stalking no matter what Lisa said, had turned up.  The older man’s doing he was sure, but still.  Len didn’t want to think about how bad the scene must’ve been to get West to soften his stance on them.  Especially after the change of plans at Ferris Air.  Beyond his frantic search for Lisa he didn’t remember much about the wreckage.  For now, he laid back and waited for the Scarlet Speedster to reappear.

Of course thinking about Barry just brought him back to the night before—practically breaking in front of the younger man.  He sighed.  With luck they’ll get this sorted before the kid and his friends get their bearings and started asking questions that he didn’t want or even know how to answer.  Just had to keep it together, stay cool and collected.  Calm.

Next thing he knew the sound of a door closing woke him from a light doze.  “Here ya go.”

Heh, the kid tossed a bag onto Ramon’s blanket-covered head, continuing to the coffee table and putting the rest of his burden down.  Are those-?

“Iris took your stuff back to Joe’s last night and washed everything.  That way you guys have something to wear today other than STAR Labs issue sweats.”  He was rubbing the back of his neck again, definitely a tell—the kid had so many of them.  Hadn’t seen that one before, though.  Len supposed having the suit on was enough of a reminder.  It was rather endearing, if he was being honest with himself, almost like a puppy.

Len blinked, recovering enough to grab his pile of clothes and standing up to head back towards the showers, not sure how to respond to that but nodding to the speedster all the same.  He’d wake Lisa and Mick when he got back, but needed some time to pull himself together.  Again.  After yet more unexpected and, quite frankly undeserved, kindness from people he only ever tormented **.** This was going to take some getting used to, that was for sure.

Mick joined him as he was finishing up.  “You said West knows?  An’ he’s coming here?  What’s the plan, Snart?”

“Just gonna go with it for now, Mick.  He’s bringing breakfast.  Got the impression that he’s one of the badges looking into what happened with Lisa.  At least that’s how it sounded from what Red told Ramon.”   

The man snorted, smirking at him.  “Still with the nicknames, Len?  Makes sense, kid’s your type for sure.”   

He closed his eyes, searching for patience.  “Nicknames are habit.”  

Refused to acknowledge the rest of his friend’s comment.  Sure, Scarlet was easy on the eyes, he made peace with that before even seeing the kid’s face.  Hard not to admire all that leather, accentuating the body underneath—from an objective standpoint.  But that was it.  Besides, they had much bigger things to focus on.

“Keep telling yourself that,” drifted into the hallway as Len walked away.  Hopefully Lisa would be awake, because he did not want to be the one who had to get her up.  Or face her wrath if he let her sleep until the Wests arrived.  No such luck, though.

Ramon still wasn’t back, but Barry was fiddling with something on the counter.  Intentionally keeping his back turned, maybe?  With an internal shrug he sat down beside Lisa, gently pulled the blanket from her face and lightly shook her shoulder.  “Lise…wake up.”  

“G’way, Lenny.”  

“C’mon Sis.  Breakfast should be here in thirty.”

That perked her up a bit. “Thought we finished the pizza last night?  There wasn’t anything else in the cabinets.”

“Iris and Joe are bringing bagels.”  Flash entered the conversation, leaving the counter as the smell of coffee began to fill the room, nodding to her pile of clothing on the table.  “Figured you’d want to change, and don’t worry, I’m sure Iris washed and dried everything properly.”

That got a real smile out of his sister.  She stood, grabbing her things and heading towards the door.  “Thanks, cutie.  You do-gooders think of everything.”  Heh, that got the kid blushing and flustered, but Lisa took pity on him and left quickly rather than waiting around for a response.

“Oh, this is going to be interesting.  Least she seems a bit more…herself?”  That last was directed to him.  

“Understatement to the first part, Flash, and yes to the second.  How long ‘til coffee’s ready?”

Len got up and began folding the blankets they used for something to do, starting with the ones Lisa used the night before.  Putting a space back in order was second nature.  It stuck with him even after he finally left for good, and a big reason he barely leaves behind evidence during a heist.  The brunette shot him a confused look before smirking and…

“Did you just—?” not that the sudden breeze in the room wasn’t answer enough.  

“Yeah, only fair.  You and Lisa tidied up last night.”  The kid delivered that with a cocky grin and raised eyebrow, somewhere between a challenge and a question.

“Of course we did.  Mess would never have happened if we weren’t here.”

“Heh, you don’t know Cisco very well.”

Len smirked at that, picking up the prox card the excitable engineer made the night before.  Unable to stop himself from shaking his head.  It was shaped like an icicle wearing a parka—properly colored and everything.  He had to ask.  “How did he make these so fast?”

“We have a 3D printer.  I bet he put the chips in place, then printed the design around them, or just whipped up a bunch of the substrate he uses in the suit and just had the printer make them with that.  It does color, too.”

How was Ramon not seriously wealthy by now?  With his ideas and ability to make practically any gadget or material that he could think of, given the time and resources…the potential was endless.  But Barry was still talking. “...Pretty sure assigning the aliases is his favorite part of all this.  You wouldn’t believe how annoyed he gets if anyone else tries, even me and Caitlin.”

“Had noticed that.  Glad he finally gave Lisa one so she’d stop going on about it.”  That got a laugh from his nemesis.  

Less than ten minutes until Detective West was expected to arrive and he still didn’t know how to interpret the offer for food.  An olive branch?  Len doubted it.  Simple courtesy, like the younger West washing their clothes?  He had no idea what to make of these people.

All he hoped for when he approached Barry was somewhere safe for Lisa to spend the night.  He and Mick were secondary and they were both prepared to have to drop Lisa off and leave.  Len had no idea how to interpret being given access to a set of rooms for the foreseeable future.  To come and go, mostly at will.  For all three of them.  Scarlet actually _apologized_ because couches were the best they had to offer on such short notice.  But the others put thought into this, selecting an area with privacy and a long term arrangement in mind.  It made him uncomfortable, edgy.  Waiting for the other shoe to drop.  Life taught him that people like this didn’t exist.  Hell, his father started those lessons before Len could even walk.  He could rely on Lisa…though she couldn’t always rely on him…and Mick to a certain extent.  That was it.  But practical strangers, people he’d hurt?  That all three of them hurt in the not-too-distant past?

A mug of coffee interrupted his thoughts.  Probably for the best—they’d have to keep their guards up and work together to figure out exactly what Flash and his friends hoped to gain from them.  At least Len was reasonably certain that West wasn’t coming to arrest them.  Yet.  He took the offered mug from Barry, nodded his thanks.  

“Cream is in the fridge, sugar is up on the counter, next to the mugs.  Wasn’t sure how you liked it but…” the kid trailed off, looking nearly as off-balance as Len felt.  He took a sip.  Needed sugar, badly.

The others returned while he was lost in thought.  Lisa was feeling better—sitting next to Cisco with a reasonable amount of space between them.  Still shaken up, trying to hide it.  That reminded him—Snow needed to take a look at her ribs.  Mick was sitting at the table, pen in hand making, yes, the grocery list.  Priorities.  Seemed like his friend wasn’t the only walking stomach in this group, though.  Based on what he saw last night the Flash put the pyromaniac to shame.

Something went off, sounded like an alarm, and the speedster disappeared again.  Seemed like the rest of the merry band arrived at the lab.  Len made a mental note that there were external proximity sensors in addition to the surveillance cameras he spotted the last time he was here.  He sat on the central couch, facing the door to the Cortex, and waited.

Barry reappeared first, at normal speed this time, with Miss West and Dr. Snow following close behind.  All three had their hands full with breakfast—the food, what looked like an assortment of juices, and coffee.   The detective brought up the rear, carrying plates and cups.  

“I couldn’t remember if we still had any coffee on hand, so we grabbed some on the way over.”  Dr. Snow said, setting her burden down on the counter. “Besides, it’s not like caffeine ever goes to waste.”

Len couldn’t agree more.  Barry and Ms. West spread the rest of the food out—with the kid tossing Mick his order at the table.  Len briefly caught sight of a mischievous grin before blurring into yellow lightning.  Within seconds all of them had their orders, complete with plates and napkins.  And he even set places for those not already sitting down.  Seemed like the Flash was showing off a bit, something West’s rolled eyes and fond smile confirmed.  Interesting.

“What? It’s kinda nice to be able to surprise people again,” his hands blurred and more of those wrappers from the night before appeared on the coffee table.  Then he picked up one of his sandwiches and started eating at a more normal, human pace.

“Sure, show off.”  The detective sat on the far couch, the one Mick slept on the night before.  The choice was deliberate—he could see everyone from that spot without having to shift.  Len considered that vantage point for himself, but decided that the central position made a stronger statement.  Besides, Mick had nearly the same view as West from his spot at the table, keeping them covered.

 

* * *

 

Thus began one of the most awkward meals Len experienced in a long time.  No one spoke, focusing on their food.  In addition to his and Mick’s orders, Barry also went with sandwiches—ham, egg, and cheese on rye, and sausage, egg, and cheese on plain—unsurprising considering how much he put away the night before.  West and Dr. Snow both went with smoked salmon, she had nova lox spread on poppy and he chose the more traditional slices on plain.  Cisco, unsurprisingly, went the sweet route—cinnamon raisin with butter, and it seemed that Lisa wasn’t the only fan of non-bagel flavored bagels.  Iris West also had a blueberry bagel, toasted with butter rather than Lisa’s preferred peanut.  Eating helped defuse some of the tension Detective West brought into the room when he arrived—Len appreciated it, doubted he’d be able to keep anything down after the upcoming conversation.  Also, as much as he preferred cooler temperatures breakfast sandwiches were best enjoyed hot.  But he knew it couldn’t last.

Almost as soon as Dr. Snow finished the last of her poppy bagel with nova lox spread there was a blur of yellow lightning, removing the detritus from the meal.  He tried to follow the kid’s movement, but it was impossible until the speedster flopped back into his spot on the couch.

“Clean houses too, Flash?”  Mick rumbled, clearly impressed.  The rest of the room burst out laughing—even the detective—as Barry Allen turned nearly as red as his suit.  

Len raised an eyebrow in his direction and couldn’t resist the urge to take advantage.  “Looks like that’s a ‘yes’, Mick.”

“You all suck.”

West shook his head, still smiling, and got to his feet for more coffee.  “Anyone else before we start?  Plenty left.”

After everyone settled back in, Barry looked from Len to Lisa before his gaze settled on the detective.  “Why don’t we get started on those details we didn’t go into last night?”

West looked directly at Len.  “You wanna start, or should I?”

Len sighed.  “Depends—you have a better handle on what happened.  I...wasn’t exactly thinking clearly.”  

Forcing that out hurt.  He prided himself on being aware at all times, of his surroundings, potential escape routes and scores, anything that gave him an advantage, especially since he and Scarlet began their game.  But unless he was mistaken, West’s expression softened a fraction at his admission, not as hostile.  

West nodded.  “Hey Bear, can you grab me the bag from the other room?”  

Moments later, a black messenger bag appeared on the table along with a gust of wind.  Nope, Len was sure that’d never get old, watching the kid do something straight out of one of Lisa’s fantasy novels without any effort.  He’s not sure what he’d do with powers like that, but playing fetch probably wouldn’t be high on his list.

West stood, walked to the table and opened the bag—deliberately, he was sure—and pulled out a mangled lump of metal and gold...Holy shit.  That was Lisa’s gun.  What was left of it, anyway.  He knew it wasn’t far from his sister when the house...Just a bit deeper and that could’ve been her, too.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The breakfast orders all come from my own friends and family--this place does exist and it is AMAZING, spoiled me for bagels forever, that's for sure.


	4. Second Chances and First Impressions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> VERY MINOR mention of child abuse and allusions to canon-typical violence and injuries.
> 
> Ongoing thanks and appreciation to [ Aunt Crimson](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Crimson1/pseuds/Crimson1) and [Liu](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Liu/pseuds/Liu) for their help, and [Granvas](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Granvas/pseuds/Granvas) for his assistance with the title.

Joe sat back and observed how the group reacted to the state of the gold gun.  Its crumpled, contorted form was more effective than anything he could say to communicate the state of the building it came from.  How lucky Lisa Snart was to have gotten out with only relatively minor injuries.  It was strange to think of her like that, after all the Rogues put Team Flash through, but it was all too easy to imagine Iris or Barry in her place.  He wouldn’t wish that kind of death on anyone.

Barry kept shooting him little questioning looks.  Joe could tell his son was expecting one of his usual lectures about being too trusting, but he didn’t have one this time.

If the past year taught him one thing it was that his kids had grown up.  Joe was disappointed it took him so long to catch on.  Ever since Iris found out Barry’s identity, the detective was trying to give both his son and daughter more credit.  They were strong, capable adults, even if he prefers to think of them as children to keep safe from the rest of the world.  That whole fiasco, keeping Iris in the dark about the Flash and her reaction to finding out the truth made the entire mess with Wells that much harder to deal with.  She had been right, and he was trying to keep his protective instincts under control.  

Besides, Barry may let his empathy get the best of him but convincing Iris, Caitlin, and Cisco to help this particular group of criminals couldn’t have been easy. His daughter was far more pragmatic than Barry, less prone to offer second chances to people that hurt her or those she cared about.  

Iris’ off-hand mention of Snart Sr. brought up his own memories of the hard, abrasive detective and Joe’s first encounter with his daughter.  Joe was still in blues, waiting for the results of his detectives’ exam when Lisa Snart cornered him in the precinct. She wanted to make a statement against her father, Lewis Snart, head of CCPD’s Organized Crime Task Force.  One glance told Joe that being in bed with the Santini family wasn’t the only thing the man should be charged with.  The teenager had one hell of a shiner, a massive black bruise on her jaw, and one arm wrapped tightly around herself, putting pressure on bruised or cracked ribs.  

They spent the next few hours closeted in a tiny interview room where she laid it all out for him, finally providing the police with enough information and evidence to build a case against the asshole.

He was escorting Lisa out when the bastard in question cornered them.  It took Joe and two other officers to keep him from attacking his own daughter in the middle of the bullpen.  Threatening her for everyone to hear, the bruises on her face made them take it seriously.  Joe couldn’t stand domestic violence.  It was bad enough against someone’s partner, but their own children?  Only monsters could do such a thing.  Certainly didn’t excuse any of the siblings’ actions over the last decade and a half, but it did help explain things.  And if their hunch was right, it seemed that the bastard was already making good on his threats.   

Joe shook his head, bringing himself back to the situation at hand now that everyone in the lounge seemed to be settling down again.  Well, everyone but Cisco.  It looked like the engineer was full-on ranting under his breath about the state of his tech  Probably promising horrible retribution for whoever dared do this to one of his creations.  The detective bit down on the inappropriate smile at the kid’s antics, very familiar with them considering the number of times Barry’s fights ended up with some sort of damage to the suit.  It was nice to be able to count on the little things when the rest of the world seemed to go mad.  Like Team Flash letting the Rogues live at STAR Labs.  Never thought he’d be more or less OK with the idea, and yet here they were.  But enough for now, Joe reigned in his thoughts, deciding it was time to get the discussion moving when Barry’s phone rang.   

The speedster shot the caller ID an incredulous pout, then looked up at Joe.  “Singh gave me today off, even took me off call!  Why…?”  Barry made a face, a combination of confused, frustrated, and resigned before answering the call, getting up to pace in front of the counter.

“Good Morning, Captain Singh—I know I can’t be late for anything yet.”  Joe brought a hand up to hide his grin.  He had no idea how Barry, who could run at least twice the speed of sound, was still perpetually late for _everything_.  He was one of a kind, that’s for sure.  And still on the phone with their boss.

“…Oh. Um, yeah, that’s fine.” His son relaxed, stopping to lean back against the sink, facing the rest of them. “My notes and stuff on the King Street jewelry heist are up in my lab, want me to—“ a pause, then, “Yeah, first thing tomorrow is perfect. I’ll go over them with Fisher in the morning.” Barry looked up and met Joe’s eyes, “I’m sure Joe and Eddie will bring me up to speed on the collapse-I mean case you just assigned me, the one they caught yesterday afternoon. You know, when I see them later today. At dinner—” He rubbed the back of his neck, Singh must’ve cut in. “Right. I’ll go over the details with the other techs after handing things over to Fisher…Yes, sir. See you in the morning.” Joe was relieved his son was officially on the case now. He knew they’d never be able to keep Barry from looking into it and this way he wouldn’t lock horns with his colleagues over their results.

Rory spoke before anyone else could, “You’re a badge too, Flash?”

“Not exactly, I’m a CSI—no badge, no gun, just plastic baggies.  Joe, Singh just put me on the case.”  Barry stated, as if they all hadn’t listened to his side of the conversation, leveling a pointed look at the mangled gold gun, getting the group back on track.

Joe leaned against the one of the sofas, crossed his arms and began to outline what he knew for the group.  “’S pretty banged up.  Eddie an’ I found it under most of the building and we figured it’d be safer here than logged into evidence.  He and I were the first on-scene and it didn’t take long to find signs of someone being pulled from the rubble.  We dug a little deeper to see if we could find anything that would help ID the victim.”

Snart spoke up from where he sat, Joe noticed the way the man’s arm tightened around his sister’s shoulders as he did.  “Found something, alright.  Any insight into how it came down?”

Joe held up a hand to stop any of the others from jumping in.  “We don’t know much yet, waiting on preliminary tests but it was clear from the extent of the damage it was sabotaged somehow.”  But they were getting ahead of themselves, “Do you have any idea how your father, or whoever was behind this, managed to find you so fast?”

Snart and Rory exchanged a look.  “No idea, Detective, part of why we came to you.  At least we knew you wouldn’t stab us in the back.”  He directed the last part at Barry.  

“Yeah, that’s more your style,” Cisco piped up.  While Joe agreed completely, they needed to stay focused, not get drawn into an argument over what happened during the meta transport.    

Snart fixed the engineer with a direct stare.  Cold as ice.  “I held up my end of the bargain.  Terms were transportation and protection.  Nothing about them actually getting on the plane or becoming complicit in human trafficking.”  He smirked, tone taking on its more familiar drawl.  

...Damn.  Joe ran it back over in his mind.  Snart was right, they didn’t establish terms specific enough.  Not that it changed his opinion about what happened, or the other man’s character.  Either way, Joe was still glad that the pipeline remained empty.  As a law enforcement officer, that arrangement _never_ sat well with him, but he had no better solution to offer—Iron Heights couldn’t contain metahumans yet, and they had to do something.  He also got the impression that if they left it to Wells, Eobard, whatever his name was, each of Barry’s encounters would’ve ended with body bags.  Cisco and some of the Starling crew were working on something to contain meta’s powers so they’d be able to go through the justice system properly.  Until then, it was catch and release encounters for the Flash.  

Given how quickly Barry got over his anger with the Rogues and his willingness to go along with their current meta strategy, his son reached a similar conclusion.

Focus, Joe.  “Maybe if you go over the entire week, or at least the time since you found out he was released we’ll be able to come up with somewhere to begin?”

Snart turned, the smirk he directed at Cisco falling away as he did, looking down in thought.    “He got out Monday afternoon.  Found out the next morning.  Let the other two know and we holed up in some of our more obscure hideouts.  Next day my place got shot up.  Knew someone must’ve ratted us out.  Ditched all but my personal phone, told Mick and Lisa what happened.  She and I went to stay at the place in the warehouse district.  Hadn’t used it in over a year, thought that’d buy us enough time to figure out our next move.”  

The pyromaniac picked up the narrative from there.  “I stayed put.  Figured the others were the targets and it’d be better to stay separate for now. Course that was wishful thinking. Assholes did a driveby at my place on Friday.  Cowards.  Me ‘n Len hid our guns and go-bags later that night just in case.  He went to you the next morning, Flash.”

Snart nodded, taking over.  “I left Saturday morning, took counter surveillance measures on my way out.  For all the good that did.  Was gone for one hundred and seven minutes.  Nothing looked off when I left.” he sighed, glaring at the coffee table.  “You know what it looked like.”  The man took a sip of his coffee, fiddling with the mug as he continued.  “Not sure how long it took me to get there.  After.  Wasn’t really burning yet.  Just smoke.  Sirens were very faint.”

Joe thought about it, fiddling with his beanie.  “Yeah, response was slower than we’d’ve liked, been stretched pretty thin lately.   Also probably took a while to be called in, not many people in the area to see what happened.”  

“Not sure how long it took me to find Lisa.  Get her out.  Sirens were a lot closer—louder and more of ‘em.  When we left.”  Snart’s free hand balled into a fist.  Joe figured he was trying to keep it from shaking—not that he could blame the man.  Just because he’d gotten familiar with close calls over the last year didn’t mean each and every one of them wasn’t a punch to the gut.  It also didn’t change how surreal it was to see Captain Cold devoid of chill.

Barry shifted to sit on the coffee table in front of the siblings.  He tucked his right foot under his left knee, all earnest understanding, and began to do his thing, piecing together clues to create the big picture.  “We can probably rule some things out now if you’re feeling up to answering a few questions?  I know you’d probably rather not think about what happened, but any details could really help us move forward.”

Barry waited for Lisa’s nod before he continued, “Did it seem like an explosion?”

Snart and Lisa exchanged a look before she responded, the bruise on her face reminding Joe of the first time they met over a decade ago in the precinct, a scared kid trying to get away from her father.  The fear was still there, harder to spot under the layers of protection she’d acquired since then.  “No, there wasn’t a blast, or heat.  I don’t remember smelling smoke until—until we were leaving.”  

“The electrical fires were barely starting when I got there.  If that helps.  Also didn’t hear anything as I drove up.  Probably would have heard or at least felt an explosion.”  Snart added.

Barry nodded, eyes losing focus a little as he spoke, mind obviously making connections already. “Plus if there was a bomb, fire would’ve made it impossible for anyone—” Caitlin coughed, interrupting Barry’s ramble.  He rubbed the back of his neck, blushing. “Sorry, bad habit of thinking aloud.  I’m usually alone in the lab so it doesn’t matter what I say. Ok, so no explosion…do you mind going over what you did yesterday morning, slowly, maybe something’ll stand out?  A sound, a smell…?”

Lisa pursed her lips, thinking.  “You know maybe...hmm.  Lenny, you left maybe a half hour earlier.  Something like that anyway, since not all of us have internal stopwatches.  You woke me up before heading out.  I was out of the shower and felt something sort of like the rumble of a subway passing under a sidewalk?  It was after my shower and just for a second before it stopped.  But it was odd, because the place was on a solid slab.  I just figured I was being paranoid when nothing happened...until the ground opened up.”

“Wait, you fell _down_?  You sure? Hmm...prolly have to go back to the scene and check that out.”  Barry’s knee bounced, careful not to interrupt and trying to resist the urge to dash off and take a look right then.

“Yeah, it was like the floor fell away.”

“And you’re sure the building was on a slab to begin with, right?” Barry gestured, becoming more animated.  “I’m not doubting you, just making sure we’re on the same page.”

“Yup, positive.  Part of why we hadn’t used the place in a while because it didn’t have a surprise escape route.  I know it doesn’t make a lot of sense, and I could be wrong...wasn’t exactly concentrating, and pretty sure I got knocked out.”  Lisa nodded, leaning into her brother.  

“Understandable,” Barry gave her a soft smile.  He reached out, hand halfway between them, always so quick to offer comfort, before he caught himself and ran it through his hair instead.  

Joe felt a proud smile forming on his face.  His son was something else.  Still so empathetic and kind even after all the shit life threw at him, never giving up or losing hope.  It was one of Barry’s best and most infuriating qualities.  Joe hoped that never changed.

 

* * *

 

They didn’t have much more to discuss until Barry had some results from the lab.  Joe had been ignoring the sidelong glances Snart kept shooting him.  He knew the other man was expecting a threat, and while he had no intention of forcing the Rogues to leave or put Barry in the middle, he’d hate to disappoint Cold.  But he’d wait until they wrapped this up.

“Ok,” Barry got to his feet.  “Sounds like we have a little bit to go on, a couple leads to follow anyway.”  He looked around at the group. “What else do we need to do today?”  

Rory spoke up from the table “Nearly done with a grocery list, Flash. You guys are low on everything edible.”

Cisco answered for Barry, gathering up the remains of the gold gun and heading towards the Cortex.  “Sounds good, man.  Lemme put this in my workshop then I’ll see what you’ve got so far.”  

The group in the lounge began splitting up.  Cisco, Iris and Rory went over the grocery list, Barry curled up with his laptop to record the case notes.  Caitlin led Lisa into the Cortex, heading towards the medical suite to take a look at her injuries.  

Snart had yet to get up, simply looked at Joe expectantly.  The detective hid a smirk, schooling his features as he closed the distance between himself and the other man, taking the spot Barry vacated on the coffee table.  It was an odd feeling, preparing to let the criminal off the hook.  Granted, life got strange ever since Barry woke from his coma but Joe never imagined he’d accept letting the internationally known thief hide out at STAR Labs rather than arresting him, the same man that threatened, hurt, his son and his friends.  Who was Joe kidding?  He considered all of them his kids at this point.  Yet here he was.

Of course, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t make the other man sweat a little first. Joe maintained eye contact, waiting.  Didn’t take long.

“Yes, Detective West?  Here to tell me—us—to get out?”

“No.  No I’m not.  Just telling you not to fuck this up.”  Joe maintained his poker face, not easy to do with Snart’s jaw practically hitting the floor. Heh, the hardened criminal wasn’t expecting that.

“Offering second chances is what Barry does, I know that won’t change.  After seeing what happened it’s not hard to imagine the state you were in during your meeting. ‘M not asking.  Don’t wanna know, don't need to know.  But I get it.  Don't throw this in his face. In any of their faces.”  He glared, putting every ounce of conviction into his voice and expression.  “Because if you do, that rock in the Pacific’s gonna look like paradise.”  

“Understood.”  Snart stopped, taking a moment to collect himself.   That made it easy for Joe to picture the thief as a much younger man, beaten and bruised like his sister.  Snart took a deep breath and continued, maintaining eye contact.  "There’s no advantage to throwing away your hospitality.  If we need to go, Detective, we will.  Like I told Barry, we will keep to your terms and outta your way.  Even try to play nice."  

“Good.”  


	5. Define 'Close Call'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After the morning's talk, the Flash and Captain Cold go to retrieve the Rogues' signature weaponry. With mixed results.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, [ Crimson](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Crimson1/pseuds/Crimson1) and [Liu](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Liu/pseuds/Liu) for your help :D Hope you all enjoy, and please let me know what you think!
> 
> (plus, any typos you find, I'm sure some managed to escape)

Lisa followed the doctor on autopilot, thoughts still fixed on the remains of her gun on the table in the lounge.The collapse was just the latest in a long string of near misses; she had always been able to brush them off before.  Not so much this time, though.  

Lisa shivered, maybe it was because they didn't usually get such obvious reminders of the danger associated with being a Rogue.  That it happened at the safe house, not during a job.  Or Lenny’s relaxed attitude towards their confrontations with the Flash made her sloppy, too.  False sense of security and all that.  

A hand on her shoulder brought Lisa's attention back to the doctor.

"Hmm?"

"Please sit back so I can take a look at your ribs.  Would you like a hand with your shirt?"

Lisa resisted the urge to snap back as a matter of principle.  Snow didn't have anything to do with her getting hurt and she certainly didn't have to offer any help.  She took a deep breath before trying to raise her arms far enough to get the shirt off and winced.  

"That...sounds good."

"You mentioned losing consciousness; any headaches, nausea?"

"No, doctor, nothing like that. Besides, we're familiar with concussion protocols."

"Please, call me Caitlin.  Especially since it sounds like you'll be here a while."

"Oh?" She knew the hope was that they’d be able to stay at STAR Labs for a little while, but the doc...Caitlin...made the arrangement sound much more open-ended; Lisa hadn't paid attention to much once West put the remains of her gun on the table.

"I got the impression that...whatever led to these injuries isn't just going to go away or blow over.  As long as you three respect the boundaries Iris laid out last night, that space we set aside is yours."

Lisa blinked, nonplussed. Wincing as Caitlin efficiently examined her ribs.

"Besides, there's very little that can tear Barry away from a new mystery to solve. **"**

"I'm sure that's only because his boss put him on the case."

The other woman shook her head, laughing softly as she rolled her chair to grab bandages and a tray of supplies, but she didn't share the joke.  Lisa decided to let it go.

"I'm going to get the stitches done first, since you've also got a pretty nasty slice under your right scapula."

That explained the stinging in the shower last night.  She nodded, although it didn't seem like the doctor was looking for a response.

"All we have for painkillers is some ibuprofen, sorry.  They're back in the Cortex."

That was weird; this was a full medical suite that clearly saw frequent use.  Maybe they were out.  "'S fine, we can grab them after you finish."

They were quiet while Caitlin stitched her up, something Lisa appreciated as she tried to get her bearings.  

"So, how bad is it?"

"Nearly all of your ribs are either bruised or cracked, but nothing's broken.  You got extremely lucky."

Did the doctor really have to rake that over?  "No shit."

Oh, she knew all right.  Lisa argued when Lenny first brought up going to the Flash for protection, but now...? It was a novel experience, knowing they were safe, really safe, for the first time in far too long.  

Caitlin gave her a rueful smile.  "Sorry, I'm used to dealing with Barry.  One needs to...point out needless stunts with him.  Not that it's been much help so far."

"Does Flash take a lot of stupid risks, then?” Lisa smirked, already knowing the answer but still curious to hear the other's response.  

“You have _no_ idea.  Although I'm sure you noticed by now.” She raised an eyebrow, “you've seen him in action a few times."

“True, he’s not exactly a ‘think first’ sort of guy.”  Part of why Lenny found him such a fascinating challenge.  That and the painted-on leather, of course.  Flash didn’t know how to back down, which only encouraged her brother to come up with increasingly elaborate schemes of his own.

Lisa shrugged.  "Apology accepted **.** You’re not the only one who has to constantly remind idiots to think before they do something spectacularly stupid."

They shared a smile.

Caitlin finished bandaging her up, bringing over Lisa's shirt and another she didn't recognize.  "We're close enough in size, if you'd like to borrow my button down?"

That...sounded pretty good.  Lisa nodded, getting dressed again.

"Thanks."

"You’re welcome.  Like I said, your ribs are pretty banged up but nothing's broken.  It’d be best if you took it easy for a few days to give them a chance to heal.  What about the others?"

"Lenny’s hands are pretty torn up, but that's it as far as I know." One of the cuts needed stitches for sure, across his right palm.

Caitlin restocked her tray and led the way back to the lounge, marching straight over to Len.

“Lisa mentioned you cut your hands up?  Let me take a look.”  

Lisa wrote the doctor off during their first meeting as mere support for the Flash rather than a true partner like Cisco.  She wasn’t often surprised by other people—her life and career made accurate character assessments essential.  However, Lisa completely misjudged the other woman and was glad for it.  

“Hmm?”Lenny looked up.  

She didn’t know why he was surprised, he should’ve expected her to mention his hands to the doc.  Or maybe he was thrown by the other woman’s direct, no-nonsense approach, considering the whole kidnapping thing that happened less than a year ago.  

Lisa just smirked at him, with a bit of sugary-sweet thrown in for good measure.  He should know the whole raised eyebrow thing didn’t work on her, never had.  Besides, at least one of those cuts needed stitches, and he was the one that taught her the importance of looking out for each other.  

“Of course, Dr. Snow.”  

Lisa resisted rolling her eyes at the formality.  It was something Len picked up after finally getting away from the old bastard and she’d seen the trick work wonders for some of his marks.

The doc started with his right hand, turning it palm-up, deliberately making eye contact.  “Caitlin will do.”  

Len nodded, “Caitlin, then.”

And she got to work.  

It was...refreshing...to have other people to talk to, who might be able to relate, who knew the value of secrets and when not to push.  She loved her brother, and Mick had grown on her, but their interactions became routine, repetitive.  If nothing else, their situation offered Lisa a chance to get closer to Cisco, always a plus.  And Caitlin might actually be worth her time as well.  

This must be what the other woman was really like, efficient, and confident in her abilities, not the timid version Lisa had first met.  Her place on the team hadn’t made any sense, someone that uptight couldn’t hope to compete with Cisco or Flash to get her opinions heard.  Caitlin’s strength was quieter, but the way she addressed Len took way more guts than Lisa imagined the doctor possessed.  

West’s daughter spoke up as Caitlin got to work. “Ok, plans for the rest of the day.  We need food, and Barry, you should probably go get the heat and cold guns before someone else finds them.”  

* * *

 

Len wholeheartedly agreed with that sentiment.  Turning the guns over to Cisco was less than ideal, but far better than the Santinis' getting their hands on them.  Or worse, his father.  Was also confident that they’d be able to get their weapons back from the engineer when this was all over.  Perhaps even without making threats.  It sucked that Lisa’s was gone, but they’d figure something out.  

“I’ll help with the food,” Mick said, looking through the cabinets.  Of course he would, was probably already planning out dinner.  “Gas stove, Snart.”

Len exchanged smirks with Lisa, more than familiar with this routine.  

Barry raised an eyebrow, lips quirking up a bit.  “Should we ask?”  

Lisa’s smirk grew.  “Mick and Lenny take cooking a bit too seriously, with delicious results.  Apparently, other heating options are ‘substandard’.  It’s probably best for all our sakes if Mick goes with you, he’s very picky about his ingredients.”  

Len tuned the rest of the conversation out, watching Dr. Snow—Caitlin—work on his hands.  Torn up worse than he thought.  She apologized for the lack of painkillers—struck him as odd that she wouldn’t have any on hand, but it wasn’t the first time he had to get patched up without.  Wouldn’t be the last, either.

Lisa nudged him, Len blinked, looking up again.  His hands were done, more stitches than he expected.  Precise and neat across his palm, pads of both thumbs, heel of his hand.  

“Run that by me again, kid?”  The rest of the group must’ve left while Snow was working on his hands.

Barry raised an eyebrow.  “Mind telling me where you and Rory hid the guns, ideally before whoever’s after you gets their hands on ‘em?  You two with those things is bad enough.”  

“Could do that.”  Len was glad Barry considered the weapons a priority, he still hadn’t figured out how to approach the subject himself.  “Should have backup for the trip, Red.  No way to know what you’re dashing into.”

“Is that your way of telling me you and Heat Wave booby-trapped the place to hell and back?”  The speedster crossed his arms, expression hardening.  

Something about what he said rubbed Barry the wrong way.  He was standing right next to the couch, forcing Len to look up to maintain eye contact.  That wouldn’t do. He got to his feet, needing the slight advantage in build over the other man.  Two could play the intimidation game, and he’d been at it far longer than Barry Allen.  

“No, just hid things very carefully.  Whole point was to ditch the weaponry someplace safe, not hang around setting traps. Making it obvious the place is not as abandoned as it appears.”

Kid stepped up to the unspoken challenge, squaring his shoulders.  “You can talk me through your hiding spots over the comms, then.”  

Len raised an eyebrow, slightly surprised by the offer but unwilling to budge.  

Caitlin spoke before he got a chance to do more than open his mouth.  “You should take him with you, Barry.  Lisa and I will run the comms.”  

Help from unexpected corners.  Len focused on the doctor, pensive.  

Lisa spoke up, “I thought you said we weren’t allowed in your work area?”

”You just walked through it to get to the med suite, and besides, inviting you in is different than providing unfettered access.”  The doctor replied, fixing the speedster with a pointed look.

“Fine, Caitlin,” Barry sighed.  “Where are we going, and what do you think we’ll be running into?”

 

* * *

 

Dr. Snow led the way into the Scarlet Speedster’s regular workspace, holding the door for the rest of them and ducking into another room rather than heading directly to their main area.  Len came in last.

 Barry waved him towards a workstation.  “Go ahead and pull up a map, let’s see what we’re dealing with.”  Before blurring, reappearing in his suit, ready to go.  

 Lisa quietly approached, laying a hand next to Len’s on the tabletop.  Looked over his shoulder at the displays  He covered her hand with his, gently squeezing.  She returned the gesture before stepping aside and standing tall once more.  

Caitlin joined them at the terminal, handing Len a pair of gloves and an earpiece.  “Here, for your hands.  These’ll keep the cuts clean and should prevent you from popping any of the stitches in case something goes wrong.”

 Len nodded, keeping his expression blank.  Hiding just how disconcerting this whole situation was.  Relieved that she didn’t seem to expect a response.

 “You’re going to want your leather jacket, too.  Jeans will hold up, but your shirt,” she trailed off.

 Len tilted his head, confused.  “What?”

 “The friction created when Barry runs.  It can—Well...I doubt you want to get there only to discover that your shirt is on fire.  The leather coat will hold up, your shirt, probably not so much.”  It sounded like the good doctor was speaking from experience.  

 “Ah,” learned something new every day.  Getting his coat was the work of a moment, but it seemed that was more than long enough for the Flash to plan out his route, ready to go.

 Barry turned to his friend, considering something.  “We don’t have any actual guns, do we?  Just in case we end up in an ambush.”

 “No, I don’t think so, Bear.  The...” she paused, carefully choosing her next words and staring deliberately at the closed door she had ducked into earlier, that Len figured hid a workshop.  “The others took the few they left here the last time they visited.”  

That wasn’t vague or cryptic at all.  Len resisted the urge to roll his eyes.  More importantly, he needed to review his research, figure out who else had access to the Flash’s inner sanctum.  Were on good enough terms to store gear in S.T.A.R. Labs.  

 Barry nodded, clearly it made sense to him.  “Thought so, oh well.  Hopefully we won’t need them anyway.  All set?”

 Len hid a sigh, the kid probably just jinxed it.  Never challenge the power of ‘worse’.  Longer they waited the more likely they’d be walking into a trap.  He popped in the earpiece and pulled on the gloves Caitlin provided, deep green, nearly black, felt a bit like leather, before zipping up his jacket and nodding.  “As I’ll ever be, Red.”

 The speedster pulled up his cowl, grinning, with actual lightning dancing in his eyes?  “Here we go, then!”

 And the Flash wasn’t kidding. Len had the breath knocked from his lungs, it felt like he was flying.  The impromptu trip into the woods those months ago took him by surprise, but this time he tried to take in the sensation.  Moving faster than the speed of sound, unless he missed his guess, like he weighed nothing at all.  

 Damn, the kid could move.  Things came back into focus, Flash must’ve slowed up a bit.  It gave Len’s brain a chance to register some of their surroundings, including some dark shapes that looked out of place.  He heard “Shit.”  Distorted, like through a wind tunnel.  And suddenly they were through the wall?  And into the building?!  

 He and Flash clearly needed to have a long talk about exactly what he could do, especially if he was dragging Len along for the ride. Later though, they had other priorities.

Barry was already talking, not needing or maybe not appreciating the time needed to get grounded again.  Len wasn’t even sure how much time elapsed.  Hated that, time had always been crucial for him.  Just knew it was longer than his first trip at the mercy of the Flash.  

“Lemme guess, you guys don’t keep brand new, shiny black Suburbans parked outside this place, do you?”

 He gave the kid the look he thought that question deserved, but answered anyway. “No, no we do not.”

 “Yeah, thought not.  Fuck.”  He touched one of the emblems on the cowl.  “Caitlin, we’ve got company.”

 Len heard the doctor’s response in his own earpiece as well.  “Be careful!  At least your trail is harder to spot during the day, but you’re going to have to hurry.”

Damnit.  Len wanted to keep this new...alliance of sorts with the Flash under wraps.  Didn’t want to give the old man a reason to look into S.T.A.R. Labs, put even more people at risk.

 “We know, be out as soon as we can.”  The speedster touched the emblem again, deactivating his microphone.  “Ok, so multiple trips are out—where’d you stash the guns?”

 “I can hold my own, Flash.”  Len shot back, moving towards the cache under the far lift.   “These things aren’t exactly light.”  

 He wasn’t kidding. Each of the duffels probably weighed about a hundred and fifty pounds.  Len highly doubted the Flash would be able to carry much more weight than Len himself, let alone him plus their go bags.

“Lenny, don’t even.”  Crap, he forgot Lisa was listening in, too.

 Barry came over to help Len get the bags out, one hand to the cowl again.  “Don’t worry, I’m not leaving him behind.  So far there hasn’t been any—” the sound of a car door slamming outside interrupted the speedster.  He and the Flash were going to have a serious talk about challenging fate.  As soon as they got out of this mess.

“Seriously Flash, how much can you carry at a dead run, anyway?”

“We’re about to find out.  There’s no way I can phase with you and the bags, though.”

 Phase?  Len shook his head, focusing on their escape route.  Priorities.  “Back door shouldn’t be blocked off.  It’s hidden from view by a dumpster so it may not be covered.”

 “Great.”  The sound of more doors now.  Fuck, they needed out of there.  Fast.

The Flash took a runner’s stance.  “Get ready.  I’m gonna do a circuit, get the door and the bags, then you.”

Len nodded, like it made a difference.  Didn’t even finish the motion before they were flying again.  

He dimly registered a muted rattling sound surrounding them, resonating in his chest—it took him a moment to realize that was automatic gunfire.  Well. That answered one of Len’s questions—the kid was indeed faster than a speeding bullet.  He saw the shockwaves.  Or imagined he did.  It was hard to tell, traveling this way.  He couldn’t breathe, certain they were moving faster than before.  

 He dimly registered Caitlin’s voice in his earpiece.  

“Barry! Based on your readings you need to stow some of what you’re carrying and soon.  Take a right, then quick left into the basement of the abandoned warehouse.”  Readings?  Exactly how teched out could painted-on red leather be?

 

That last bit made sense, delivered as the kid stumbled out of his run, falling.  Twisted his body as they went down so he’d take the brunt of the impact rather than Len.

“Holy shit, these are heavy.  You could’ve warned me.”  Barry groaned.  His voice was close, Len could feel it rumble through his side.  “Remind me not to try that again for a while.”

“If you’ll recall, I did warn you.”  Len shot back, taking stock.  No new injuries from their less-than-graceful landing.  Registered the Flash’s arm around him, the other under his knees?!

“This how you carry everyone over the threshold, Scarlet?”  It came out before Len could stop himself.  He’d properly think about the Flash zipping him around bridal style when they were back at S.T.A.R. Labs.  

 Len could hear his sister smothering giggles through the comms.  Sadly, the kid didn’t react beyond a blush, letting Len go and sitting up.

 “Thanks, Caitlin, you’re a lifesaver!  Not literally though, they missed us by miles.”

“Is this how you always are, kid?”  Damn.  How on earth had Barry survived nearly a year as the Flash?  Len shook his head, deciding to let it go for now.

 Lisa’s voice came over the comms.  “I don’t know what measuring stick you’re using, Flash, but it’s defective.  That was really fucking close from where I was sitting and I’m nowhere nearby.”

 “Nah, not really.  They only had Uzis.”   _What?!_  Only—there was no way Len heard that properly.  

 Len broke in before the exchange got any stranger.  Someone had to be the voice of reason.  He wasn’t sure who was worse with staying on task, Barry or Mick.“Don’t you think we could continue this elsewhere?  Close call or not, we need to get back.”

 “Sure, I’ll get you back first, then swing by for the bags.”

 “No.  Take the bags—“ Len was interrupted by the whirlwind of the Flash.  “—then come back for me.”  He completed his protest on principle, booted feet touching down next to Lisa back in the Cortex.  Len didn’t think the kid even stopped to put him down.

 The doctor sent him a commiserating look.  “He does that sometimes.  Almost all the time, actually.”

 One hundred and eighty five seconds later and the Flash was back.  Dropped to his knees to get the bags off his back.  To be fair, that was the easiest way to get out of duffels that size.  “For real, Len, what’s _in_ those things?  Lead?!”

 “Necessities.”  He responded, terse.  Scowling at the younger man.  “What happened to me being backup?”

 “Chill, man.”  

 That little shit.  

 Lisa snickered, Barry grinned at her.  Yes, entirely intentional pun.  Len refused to allow his expression to soften, raising an eyebrow and crossing his arms.

 "Keep running your mouth, kid.  Doesn't change the fact you should've taken the bags first."

 “They were after you, not your stuff.  Besides, I took another pass by the hideout and whoever ambushed us were still trying to turn it into Swiss cheese.  Made more sense to drop you off first.”  

 The kid was missing the point.  And _fuck_ , did any of the shooters see him?

 “Lighten up, Lenny.  You’re both back in one piece and none the worse for wear.”  Lisa smirked at him, sugary sweet.  “Why don’t we check out the rest of our new digs?”

 “In a minute or two, Sis.  Flash, did your risk-taking at least net us useful information?”

 The kid rolled his eyes and blurred once again, reappearing at one of the computer terminals.  In street clothes. "Let's take a look.  I'm not sure if Cisco's emblem camera can pick stuff up at super speed or not.  I didn't want to get too close, or risk stopping for an actual look in just in case they were feeling observant."  

 At least he had a little sense.  Too bad they had no way to know if any of the hired hands spotted the two of them flashing into the abandoned garage.  Had to have seen _something_ to get out of the SUVs and start shooting.  

 "Ugh, no luck unless any of you can make out any details?"

 Caitlin walked over to stand behind Barry's chair.  "Did you try one of Felicity's programs yet?"

 He nodded.  "Yeah.  I'll ask Cisco to take a look when the others get back in case he has any ideas." Barry tilted his head back, glancing between Len and Lisa.  "Really? No idea who could've been shooting at us?"  Tone more than a little skeptical.

 Len glanced at his sister before meeting the kid’s eyes.  “Few possibilities.  Based on the location, my money’s on the Santinis.  They’ve been chilly since Mick and I took out the old don.”

 Barry snorted at that.  “Ok...so do we chalk that up to yet another group of people you pissed off and leave it at that, or does the ambush connect back to your father somehow?”  

  _Fuck_.  Of course the kid was good at his day-job.  Len was hoping to avoid this conversation so soon into their arrangement.  Not sure how the other would take being drawn into a mob war.  Nothing for it now.  

 “Not sure.  It’s possible.  Asshole never sold out his contacts.  Was...involved with the Santinis.  Wouldn’t be surprised if he called in some favors.”

 The kid ran a hand through his hair, “Great...and if he is, that upsets the balance of power among the families, and completely explains the increase in tension lately.  Not to mention my suddenly really shitty work schedule.”  He got up, pacing.  “You couldn’t’ve mentioned the mob angle last night?  Or at least _before_ we left to get your stuff?”

 What did the Flash expect?  Tense, exhausted, and still fired up from the close call just ten minutes earlier, Len snapped. Got in the younger man’s face.  

 “Sure, Flash.  How do you think that would’ve gone?  ‘Can we stay at your place?  And if you agree to let us crash, it’s likely you and your friends become targets for the ongoing mob war.  A war that, by the way, I think my father started?’  Would’ve been a short conversation.”

 Barry set his jaw, not giving an inch, leaning in.  “Yeah, because the one we had _clearly_ covered all of the pertinent information.”

 “It was ‘need-to-know’.  You didn’t.”  Len shot back, aiming to freeze the kid out.  

 “ _Bullshit_.  You came to me for protection, how can I—we—provide that if you don’t give us the full picture?!”  

 “Back to my original point.  We _needed_ somewhere safe to crash.  Telling you would’ve been counterproductive.”  Did he really have to spell it out for the kid?  Would he at least allow them to take the go-bags before kicking them out?

 “That’s a load of crap.  You’re telling me you would’ve pulled this level of ‘need-to-know’ on Heat Wave?  Or your sister?”

 Well no, not that he’d admit that.  Len opened his mouth to respond, but didn’t get a chance before the speedster continued.  

 “Yeah, don’t bother.  We both know you wouldn’t.”

 Did the other man really not get it?  He, Lisa, and Mick _needed_ somewhere safe to regroup after...what happened yesterday.  The entire week since his father’s release proved that none of his usual strategies would work—STAR Labs was all he could come up with.  Jeopardizing the slim chance that Barry Allen and his friends would agree to let them crash was not an option.  Len just...slipped up by allowing himself to hope they’d be able to hide out for more than the one night.  But the Flash wasn't done.

 “Ignoring that, the hell kind of backup doesn’t at least drop hints about what we walked into?!”

 “Brought up going with you in the first place.”  And foolishly thought no one would’ve been able to find the place so soon.  Len couldn’t believe he’d been so careless.  Didn’t know why he was wasting time arguing over this instead of considering the next plan, since S.T.A.R. Labs was off the table.

 The other man just scoffed at that.

 “Barry, maybe…”  Dr. Snow cut in.  

 Fuck.  Len closed his eyes.  How had he gotten so caught up that he forgot about their audience?

The kid glanced at her, then Lisa.  His stance shifted a bit and he shook his head, giving Len a hard look.  “Cold, Len, we _will_ continue this discussion later once the others get back to see what we can piece together.  Why don’t you unpack your stuff and start settling in?”

 Len...had no response.  There was no way he heard what he thought he did.

 “You’re letting us stay?”  Lisa ventured, sounding so small and young.  Like she had before he abandoned her to their father.

 Barry actually looked confused at that.  “Yes, why wouldn’t we?  The only thing that changed is that now we have a slightly better picture of what the three of you are up against.  Granted, it would’ve been nice to know that earlier to get more precautions in place, but it’s been less than a day, shouldn’t be too hard to fix.”

 Len and Lisa exchanged glances; the speedster sighed.

 “Look, it’s obvious from your injuries, Lisa, that this isn’t some kind of setup the Rogues cooked up to get one over on me and my friends.  Would it have been _nice_ to know that you suspected a larger mafia angle?  Yes.  Does it matter in the scheme of things?  Not really.  Besides, you withholding information isn’t exactly news.  And if those goons did see us at that ambush, they’ll be looking into my team as well.”  

 The kid ran a hand through his hair before continuing, “As long as you keep to the terms, you can stay here.  ”  

 Len considered that.  He’d never make such an open offer, but it did make sense.  Fit in with what he’d already figured out about the Flash’s weaknesses and world view.  “Fine.  Do you mind if I unpack our weapons?” Voice clipped, hard.

 Snow and the speedster exchanged a look.  Barry shrugged, “Sure, lemme call Cisco and see where he wants ‘em.”

 Len narrowed his eyes.  “Why call Ramon?  I thought you wanted our weapons locked into that safe by the garage?”

 “Sure, if you want.  But I landed on those bags kinda hard—Cisco should prolly take a look to make sure nothing cracked or broke.”  He was dialing the engineer before Len could think of anything to say—why would the scientists care if the guns were broken?  

 “Hey, man.  Yeah, we’re back…No, nothing too eventful.”  Caitlin scoffed at that.  Len barely stopped himself from doing the same.  

 “A little trouble, but just Uzis, nothing too—Yes, the suit is fine...Sure, I’ll fill you in when you get back.  Where do you want the guns?  They may have gotten a bit banged up…Sure, I’ll put ‘em in there.  Later.”

 He hung up, looking over at Len.  “If it’s ok with you, I’ll put ‘em in Cisco’s workshop with Lisa’s?”

 Len nodded slowly.  Wanting to ask—

 “Is Cisco really going to fix my gun?  Look over the other two?”  Lisa spoke for both of them, incredulous.

 Barry and Caitlin burst out laughing.  He didn’t know what was so funny—no way _he’d_ do something like that…or knew anyone who would.

 “Oh yeah.  Cisco takes this stuff personally.  As far as he’s concerned this is still _his_ suit…on good days he agrees to joint custody.”  Barry waved a hand at the Flash suit, on the mannequin once more.

 “Expect many rants over the state of your gun…many, many rants.  And probably a whole lot of ideas for upgrades.”  The kid was smiling at them both, shared a knowing glance with Caitlin.  Len just raised an eyebrow.  Did the Flash really forget that he was typically the one in their cross-hairs?

 “Go ahead and get ‘em out, Cold, I’ll put them in his workshop.  Then you two can pick rooms and I’ll shift the couches around so there’s space in the Lounge again.”

Len followed Barry’s suggestion automatically; comforted his body knew what to do even as his mind struggled to catch up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And this is why I asked about humans surviving travel at Mach+ without protection of some kind (like a jet) on tumblr a while back. Apparently, 2 men have hit Mach 1.24 while skydiving, though they hit that speed in dramatically thinner air than sea-level. So we're just going to go with 'traveling with Barry protects people from super speed', although they probably couldn't withstand more than Mach 1.25 for very long, since breathing is impossible at that speed (among other things). Hence my choice of weapon, which has a muzzle velocity of Mach 1.18. Barry's running at around Mach 1.25 during the first portion of the escape.
> 
> Additional note--the next chapter may be similarly slow as far as posting goes. I need to work out more of the outline before getting much deeper into the plot :)


	6. A Mad Scientist, a Reporter, and a Supervillain walk into a Grocery Store

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The much-anticipated shopping trip, and an attempt to get useful information out of the Rogues--easier said than done.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, [ Crimson](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Crimson1/pseuds/Crimson1) and [Liu](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Liu/pseuds/Liu) for your help :D Hope you all enjoy, and please let me know what you think!
> 
> P.S. I did work out their dinner menu, if anyone's interested :D

“Well, Barry made it back to the Labs with your stuff, and it _sounded_ like you three didn’t give us the full picture, Heat Wave.”  Cisco reported, shoving his phone back into his pocket.

 The man in question grunted but otherwise ignored his comment.  Iris, though-

 “What was that about his suit?”

 “Nothing, nothing, they’re both fine.  Just some unexpected company.”  And, yanno, the suit might be fine but apparently Lisa’s gun wasn’t the only one that needed fixing.  He heaved a sigh—why was it _always_ his stuff that got broken?  Then again, he had more than a few new ideas...

 The whole situation was just another day in Central City since the accelerator went critical, if he was being honest with himself.  Going grocery shopping with _Heat Wave_.  Who, apparently, was a complete foodie.  At least that could work to their benefit; maybe they could convince the Rogues to cook for them, too.

 “This is weird, even by our standards.  Why are we all here again?!”  Cisco still couldn’t quite wrap his head around it.  

 “Well, it’s my car, you don’t trust anyone else to restock your snack supply...” Iris said.

 “Because you never get the right stuff.”

 “And I don’t trust _either_ of you to stock a proper pantry,” the pyro added. “If my crew’s going to be holed up in the lab for any length of time, we need decent food.  You two provide me with cover.”

 Great.  That didn’t really make it any less surreal, and Cisco hadn’t actually been expecting an answer.  Even if the other man had a valid point about no one expecting to see him and Iris out grocery shopping with Mick Rory of all people.

 “All right...then why this place?”

 Heat Wave glowered down at him.  “It’s not a major national chain, the family built it from the ground up.  They’ve got good quality stuff, lots to choose from.  Most of their suppliers are local farmers and family-owned places that use sustainable practices; prices also don't suck.  I’d rather support them than Whole Foods.”

 Cisco glared at the...way larger, significantly more intimidating man.  Even _without_ his Heat Wave gear.  “I‘m just surprised you care about stuff like that, considering your career path.”

 Iris walked between them with a cart, effectively ending their stare-down.  “Come on, you guys can argue over this later.  I’m not going to let this turn into an all day event.”

 The engineer snagged a basket on his way in.  “Sure, I’ll go grab the snacks while you take care of the boring stuff.”  

 He hadn’t really properly cooked since grad school, well, probably longer.  It took too much time and he had a bad habit of getting lost in his work.  It was way easier to just order takeout, and it wasn’t like he had to worry about finances any more...ever.  And that’s even without the patent applications Ray and Barry made him submit before his dissertation.  Well, ok, not _made_ , but still.  He hated to admit that they were right, no way someone else wouldn’t jump on the idea as soon as his paper was out there, so why give them the opportunity?  

 Not that he’d ever turn down a freshly-cooked meal, just didn’t have the patience to do it himself.  And no matter how tense it ended up being, it’d probably still be more relaxed than dinner at home with his parents.  

 This place was a maze; it took him about a half hour to grab the necessities and way longer than it should’ve to find Iris and Rory.  Who hadn’t even made it all the way through the produce section.  Cisco sighed.  It was gonna take _forever_.  

“This is as far as you’ve gotten?”  

 “What do you expect, kid?  The kitchen is virtually empty; starting from nothing takes longer.  I need to make sure we won’t get back only to realize we forgot something essential.  Like _actual_ snack food.”  Heat Wave gave his basket a judgmental look, adding a bag of smallish oranges to the cart.

 “And what’s so special about oranges?”

 “They’re blood oranges, much better than the regular ones.  Lisa’s favorites.”

 Oh, good to know.

 Iris looked up from where she was selecting tomatoes.  “Cisco, if you want to help us get out of here, put your snacks in the cart and take part of the list.”  

 He heaved a sigh, holding out a hand.  Rory rolled his eyes, carefully folding and tearing the paper, handing Cisco the shorter piece.  “Here, they’re just dry goods.  You should be able to handle that.”

 The engineer shook his head, quickly unloading the snacks into the cart.  Rory’s hand landed on his shoulder, Cisco gave it a look.

 “Chicken work for your crew for dinner? ‘n how much does Allen eat so we get enough?”

 Ooh, nice.  Maybe he wouldn’t have to do any convincing after all.  

 “Chicken would be lovely, thanks,” Iris said, her smile still a little forced but obviously more relaxed than Cisco felt.

 “Don’t worry about Barry.  Seriously, man.  The math is insane.  I think we’ve nearly figured something out, but until then those calorie bars work to keep him running.”  Cisco offered an answer to the second question.

 “Mhm.  So if I double what I’d make for me ‘n Len for just his portion...that’d be a start?”  

 He thought about it, looking the (much) larger man over.  “Yeah sure, that’ll prolly work.”  And then, because he’d never been able to keep his mouth shut: “Why are you doing this?”  

 Dammit, and there probably went the free food.  

 Heat Wave just smirked, like he knew exactly what Cisco was thinking.  “I like to cook, you have a pretty good setup that never sees any use.  You put us up, and I get the impression none of you will accept payment.  So, we feed you to even things out.”

 Ooookay.   Except feeding them only went so far, even once you factored in Barry’s appetite.  “Sure, man, maybe for _this_ , but it doesn’t even come close to—Hey!”

 Iris stepped on his foot, glaring at both of them.  “This is _not_ the time for this discussion.  Let’s just get what we came for and add this to the list of uncomfortable conversations to have this evening.  That way we can get this all out of the way _once_ , without creating a scene, increasing the risk that someone connects you three to the rest of us.  Mick, chicken will be perfect.  What do you want to go with it, bread, potatoes, veg?  Why don’t you get a second cart, we’ll need it if you really do intend to feed all of us without having to go on daily food runs.  Cisco, please just go get what’s on there and come find us again.  Thank you.”  

The look on Heat Wave’s face was pretty great.  Take-Charge Iris was certainly a force to be reckoned with.  And hot.  Cisco quietly picked up the basket and set out, just shaking his head.  A quick glance over his shoulder had Iris in charge of the cart and the pyro meekly heading back to the entrance to grab another.  It was good having Iris on the team.

 At least they made it to the butcher section by the time Cisco gathered all of the pantry items.  

 “So...are you thinking menu, or just grabbing whatever passes for ‘the usuals’ with you guys?”  If they were making a menu, Cisco so wanted in.

 “Basics for now, kid.  We can make a menu before dinner, save the deeper stuff for after.”  

 “Worried about indigestion?  That’s rich, figured you’d be used to all sorts of uncomfortable conversations over dinner.  Isn’t that sort of what you people _do_?”  

 Heh, looked like that hit a nerve with Heat Wave.  Oh shit.

 “That how you want to play it?”  Rory was in his face a moment later, crowding him between the cart and shelves a hell of a lot faster than Cisco expected.  “Flash and West gave the impression that this isn’t a business transaction; why shouldn’t we enjoy the meal?”  

 “I can’t leave you two alone for two seconds!”  Iris for the save.  Again.  Her tone was that fake kind of happy she used around them for the first few weeks after finding out Barry was the Flash.  Not good.

 “Just get both kinds instead of fighting over which is best, guys.”  She grabbed whatever was on the shelf he was pressed against.

 “That’s enough, both of you.  I thought the whole point was _not_ to draw attention to ourselves, great job making a scene.  What do we have left, let’s just get out of here as soon as possible.”  Iris hissed, glaring at them both until Heat Wave took a step back, grabbing his cart again.

 “Fine.  You finish that page, I’ll meet you both at check-out.”  

 Cisco wasn’t expecting that, to see the pyromaniac just let Iris boss him around without pushing back somehow.  Based on his fights with Barry, Rory wasn’t exactly the type to listen to reason once he got fired up about something; even Cold could barely reign him in.   But if he’d learned _anything_ over the past few months, it was not to underestimate Iris, and splitting up meant he could avoid Heat Wave until they got back to the Lab and he could yell properly.  

 Barry may be all for them being the good guys, helping out whoever asked, but Cisco wasn’t so sure.  He couldn’t...separate things the way Barry could; set aside his anger at everything Cold and Heat Wave (and ok, fine Lisa, too) did to them to focus solely on whoever dropped a building on Glider.  And his gun.  

 The engineer had a hard time buying that their _father_ was really behind all of this, but he was willing to accept it for now.  Especially since once it turns out to be bullshit, they’d be justified in locking the Rogues up once and for all.    

 Everything else went smoothly...ish.  Rory insisted on paying, something else about evening the scales for letting the Rogues hide out at STAR Labs.  The man even assured them that the card was legit minus the name, promising to prove it when Iris refused to budge.  Cisco only put up a token protest; if Heat Wave was volunteering to try to keep up with Barry’s appetite, well, he could think of worse ways for the man to spend his ill-gotten gains.  

 

* * *

 

Why did his tech always have to take a beating?  Cisco scooped up the cold gun, the tablet, and his tools to look the weapon over in the lounge.   

 It didn’t take him long to regret that decision.  Cold kept glancing at him and the gun, reminding him of the last time he worked on the weapon in that Santini safehouse, trying to keep the man from killing Dante.  Cisco took a deep breath, letting it out slowly, hooking his tablet up to the gun to run diagnostics.  He glanced around while the program ran, glad the extra couches were gone.

 Barry, Cold and Heat Wave were unpacking the food; being friends with the Flash had its perks—not having to help unload groceries was just a fringe benefit.  It sounded like Iris, Lisa, and Caitlin were down in the Rogues’ wing doing...who knew what.  Probably figuring out what they needed to make it habitable.  

 Cisco hid a grin behind his tablet.  Barry kept trying to help put everything away, but Cold and Heat Wave just ended up rearranging things behind him.

“Flash, that‘s nice and all, but stop helping.”  Rory grumbled.

 Barry looked over, confused.  “I’m just putting stuff where it goes.”

 “That would carry weight if your crew actually cooked, but since you don’t, back off and let me an’ Len arrange this stuff properly.”

 His tablet beeped; Cisco tuned out the rest of the room, reviewing the diagnostic readout.  Crap.  Good thing Barry wanted him to check the weapon out, it wasn’t stable.  The gun would backfire like crazy the next time Cold tried to use it. Which actually might be a reason to leave it alone...if Cisco was that kind of person.  But he wasn’t.  He might _really_ not like the guy but no one should end up like Deathbolt.   And the thought of doing a bad job on purpose...he couldn’t force himself to do that either.  If he was that type of engineer, he would’ve rigged the damn things to backfire when he rebuilt them instead of simply removing the firing pin on Cold’s gun.  

 Besides, it may not even last that long.  Based on the readings he was getting, the cold cell could turn itself into a bomb simply sitting in storage.  Not good at all.  Barry must’ve landed on it _hard_.

 “Crap.”

 He needed to do a full inspection, then get the everything stabilized so he’d be able to hook the thing up to...Cisco became aware of eyes on him and he looked up, watching Cold’s approach.

 “How much damage did Barry do?”  

 “More than I expected, you guys must’ve gone down hard.  There are hairline fractures along the cylinder—see here?  The fluid’s escaping, freezing along the containment unit itself, gradually expanding the fissures.  Sublimation removes the ice and the process repeats.  Basically, the integrity of the entire thing is compromised.  It’s looking less risky to dismantle the weapon and completely rebuild rather than attempting a patch job.  There’s a very narrow margin between fully functional and catastrophic failure…your ‘soft’ landing totally skewed things towards kaboom.  And I’m not just talking backfire, here—it’s gone from gun to bomb, and a really poorly formulated unstable bomb at that. ”   

 The man’s face went...well...cold.  “So this is just an excuse to destroy our weapons after all?  Well played, Flash, Ramon.”

 Cisco fired back, pissed.  ”It’d serve you right.  Since stealing my guns you’ve derailed a train, kidnapped Caitlin, kidnapped and tortured my brother.  Me.  Why should you get to keep them?!”

 “Leaving out the fact that our agreement for this _arrangement_ stipulates their return?”  

 Cisco refused to be intimidated in his own Lab...even though Snart was staring him down, arms crossed, practically looming over him.

 ”Yeah, because your word means so damn much, Cold.”

 Barry zipped over, materializing between him and the supervillain, glaring at them both.  “Look, can we just...agree they pulled some really crappy stunts and just _drop_ it for now?!  And maybe focus on how the guns got messed up in the first place?”

 Cold’s expression didn’t shift but Cisco heaved a sigh.  He didn’t want Barry to have to play peacekeeper all the time, but having Cold and Heat Wave in their space sucked.  Even if the Rogues were willing to cook for everyone.  

 Cisco nodded, forcing himself to relax at least a little.  It might’ve been his imagination, but it seemed like Snart’s expression softened slightly, too.  

 “Yeah, ok, fine.  So what happened?”  Cisco glanced between them.  Heat Wave stilled, the rhythmic sound of knife hitting cutting board falling silent.  

 Barry outlined the cliff-notes version. Yup, that would’ve been a lot more fun than the way he spent his afternoon.  And it might’ve been possible to make adjustments to the emblem-cam on the fly.  Well, probably not, Felicity might be able to do that at Barry’s speed but it’d take him a few tries to get that fast.  

 “Do you think it’d be possible to incorporate a high-speed camera into the emblem, instead?  It’d have better resolution.”  Barry asked.  

 “Not sure, it’s not really my area of expertise.  So far I don’t know of anything commercially available, or even not so commercially available, that’s small enough to affix to the suit.  There’s also no way of knowing how it’d handle trying to record things at Flash-speed.  Most of those things need to stay steady to function, but I’ll get in touch with Ray and Felicity, see what we can come up with.  It might be possible to repurpose some of the cameras Eobard used to bug our places as a starting point.”

 Barry made a face at that.  “The treadmill probably won’t work for testing, though.  The premise is me moving at speed past something, not running in place.”

 “We’ll add it to the Pipeline training sessions.  I’m already working on some new drones to test, since both Caitlin and Iris vetoed the lasers and the heat-seeking missiles even though those worked out perfectly at the airfield.”  Cisco replied.  He and Barry shared commiserating looks at their team members’ reluctance.  “I even reduced the payload to account for the confined space—no sense risking any more structural damage.

 “But anyway, back to earlier.  It’s a good thing they didn’t have anything more powerful than the Uzis.”

 “Why?  I can avoid most things below serious military-grade.”

 “Yeah _you_ can, maybe.  Probably.  But while you’re whisking someone else along, not so much.  As it was you were pushing the limits of what people have been able to endure without some sort of physical protection.  You know, like jet fuselage…and I don’t think the speedforce really counts.  We should probably test that soon, could be fun.  Did you phase in?”

 The speedster nodded, sharing a grin.

 “Hey, Cold—how did that trip feel?  Could you tell you went through a wall?  Was there anything different between the segments?  You getting to the garage, to the warehouse, and then back to the lab?  Were you able to breathe? I need details.”  Cisco rattled off, grabbing his tablet to take notes.

 Snart was the picture of incredulity, setting his knife down on the table and giving up the pretense that he wasn’t listening intently.  Not that it was a private conversation to begin with, but still.

 “It’s for SCIENCE, man.”

 Barry just cracked up, eyes jumping between him, Heat Wave, and Cold.

 “Heh, and you thought I was bad, Snart.”  Rory called across the room.  

 Cold’s glare was positively glacial, but the pyro just smirked even wider.

 Cisco continued to work on the cold gun, making a note in his tablet to follow up on the Flash-travel questions later.  Deactivating the cylinder, stabilizing the reactions that made it function, improving the overall stability enough to transport the components back to his workshop.  Which he did, swapping cold for heat after setting up the cylinder to drain.  By the time he made it back to the lounge the Rogues moved on, breaking down chicken for dinner.  

 Barry perched on the arm of Cisco’s couch, fiddling with his phone.  

 “Hey, can you shoot Ray an email?  We need to move up the handover at the Lab so we can increase security without drawing attention.”  Barry’s voice wasn’t much above a whisper, eyes fixed on the Rogues in the kitchen.

 “Sure, though you could do that just as easily.”

 “Not really, my schedule’s gonna be nuts until CCPD gets a handle on things.  You guys should pick a time and I’ll do my best to make it.”  

 “Ah.  I take it we’re not mentioning recent developments, then?”  Cisco just loved the secret game; it always turned out just _great_.

 Barry sighed, making a face.  “Yeah.  We’ll fill them in here.  I don’t want to take the risk of putting this in an email, and it isn’t like we’re short on rooms to have private conversations.”

 That was certainly true.

 Ray responded almost immediately.  They hammered out the details, bringing Ronnie and Professor Stein into the loop as well.  It was exciting that STAR Labs was coming back to life; the place had been dormant for far too long.   If having the Rogues around sped that up, well, maybe they had their uses after all.

 

* * *

 

Barry hated being at loose ends, but he couldn’t really help Cisco with the weapons and the Rogues worked together seamlessly.  Trying to give them a hand would probably just slow things down.  

 The speedster watched, quietly impressed.  They didn’t even need to speak.  It was so different from how Captain Cold and Heat Wave worked together during a heist...or was it?  Because even amid the chaos they loved to create, the men still clicked, keeping Barry too busy to do more than try to keep them from getting away with their intended score.   Especially if Barry ignored the banter.  He was starting to get the idea that Heat Wave was almost as much an act as Captain Cold.

 “So lead was a pretty close guess for your bags, I see.  Why do you carry a professional kitchen in your survival kits?”  Barry asked, waving his hand at the stack of pans and knife rolls on the counter.  

 ”It _is_ survival. They whine like three-year-old's if they don’t have the proper tools.”  Lisa’s voice floated into the lounge.

 “Gotcha, sounds like Cisco.”

 “Hey!”  

* * *

 

 Dinner was delicious.  If the Rogues wanted to feed him and his friends as a form of ‘quid pro quo’ for allowing them to hide out, Barry was _not_ going to complain.  

 He sped through the cleanup, waving off offers to help.  It was already starting to get late and he really wanted to get through this before he got any Flash calls.

 Iris leaned against the head of the table, facing the entire group.  “Did you three neglect to mention anything else this morning, or just the mafia connection?”

 The Rogues exchanged meaningful glances.  Great, just great.  Another exercise in pulling teeth.  Barry clenched his jaw but kept quiet, for now.

 Unsurprisingly,Cold took the lead.  “Barry dashed into the middle of an intended ambush.  No way to know who set it, but probably the Santini’s.”

 “Were they using whatever you’re running from to try to take you out, or is it linked to why you’re hiding out here?  It’s not like you and Heat Wave haven’t actively screwed with them before.”  Cisco jumped in, clearly on edge with the Rogues around.  “And how _exactly_ does your father factor into all of this?  I mean, pissing people off is clearly your super power, but this seems pretty damn extreme.”

 ”I finally got enough dirt that even the cops couldn’t ignore the shit he was involved in.”  Lisa responded, thankfully keeping her tone even rather than using the sugary simper that never failed to set Caitlin off.  Or make Cisco blush.

 What she said rang true, but Barry got the sense that it wasn’t the whole story.  Something nagged at him, something Joe said during their first discussion about Snart before he got his hands on the cold gun.  How Snart Sr. was a drunk, and a dirty cop that—oh.  Took his anger out on his kids.  That...could explain a _lot._

Cisco jumped off the counter, pacing.  “So we’re just gonna _ignore_ the kidnapping bullshit?  And you and Lisa dicking us over at Ferris Air?”  He glowered at the siblings, then whirled around to face the group.  “Why are we so sure Cold didn’t arrange that supposed ambush, or that this whole damn thing isn’t just another setup?”

 “If you think I’d volunteer to get a building dropped on me just so Lenny could get one over on the Flash, you’re an idiot.”  Lisa glared at the engineer, taking a half-step forward in front of her brother, almost like she was shielding him.  

 Cisco threw his hands in the air, blushing a little.  ”Yeah, I know.  This is all just—” waved his arms in an attempt to capture just how insane everything was.  “Let’s go with ‘worse than finding out your mentor is a supervillain from the future hell-bent on killing your best friend, that might’ve _actually_ killed you in an alternate timeline that _somehow_ I can still remember.’”  

 Barry, Caitlin and Iris facepalmed.  

 A quick glance between his fingers showed Barry that the Rogues were shocked as shit.  Under other circumstances the speedster would want to take pictures, because really, a completely gobsmacked Leonard Snart was priceless.  But this just...opened up a whole new can of worms that they _did not_ need to get into tonight.  Or ever, at least not with these three.   

 ”For real?  This is worse?”  Barry shook his head and charged on before anyone could ask any questions.  “Never mind.  Can we try to focus, please?  I doubt it’ll stay quiet for long and Singh will kill me if I’m late tomorrow.”  He waited for everyone to nod.  “Which families do we have to worry about aside from the Santinis?  And how serious were you about recruiting the metas you freed, could any of them be contributing to this mess?”

 Snart crossed his arms and stood straighter.  “I’m not a rat, kid.”

 “Not good enough, Cold.”  Barry zipped into the other man’s personal space, so done with this game.  He drew himself up to his full height—oh hey, apparently he _was_ a little taller than Snart—staring the thief down.

 “We have no intention to _ever_ work with Nimbus.  Even before you two had your little meet-and-greet in the woods, Flash **.** It’s never been about the body count and that’s all he has to offer.”  Rory interjected.  

 Barry nodded.  He was pleasantly surprised—and a little confused—that the pyromaniac was taking on a more diplomatic role instead of helping Cold pick a fight.

 Cisco scoffed but _finally_ seemed to be on board with leaving the past alone for now.  Thankfully.  “What about Mardon?  Bivolo?”

 “As far as I know, they haven’t made any moves either way.”  Lisa replied.

 Barry sighed, relaxing a bit but not moving beyond that, still in Snart’s personal space.  “Great.”  

 “As far as _you_ know, Lisa.  What about you, Leonard?”  Iris narrowed her eyes, looking between the siblings.

 Barry clenched his jaw; glad Iris caught the specific wording.  Trying to talk to the Snarts gave him a headache.

 Cold flicked his eyes over Barry’s shoulder, something that might’ve been a grimace turning into a scowl.  He stared down at Iris, stretching the moment out until the silence became even more uncomfortable.  The speedster _hated_ power plays like this.  “We haven’t exactly kept in touch.”

 And he wasn’t the only one.  Caitlin got to her feet, shoulders tense.  ”Well, this is clearly going nowhere.  We need to watch out for Nimbus, the others may or may not have joined up with you three, but none of you trust them.  Does that sound about right?”

 Iris picked up her train of thought.  “Or if they have approached you, it’s still just the early stages, making it too risky for you to rely on them.  Which is why you had to come to _us_ for protection.  Ok, we can work with that.”

 Barry glanced at Iris, wishing she hadn’t let Snart off the hook so easily.  Even just a hint about what Mardon, Baez or Bivolo were up to since their release would’ve been a huge help.  Or the gist of where Mardon stood about getting revenge for his brother.  

 “What about increased security around here?”  Snart demanded, clearly done talking about the metas.

 ”It’s already in motion, Cold.  The initial stages should be in place by Friday.”  Barry replied, refusing to go into greater detail.  The Rogues weren’t the only ones that could withhold information.  Granted, it was petty and they’d find out soon enough, but still.   

 The other man looked like he wasn’t done, opening his mouth just as the alarm in the cortex went off.  

 “Duty calls.  With luck it’ll be the goons from before,” Cisco grinned, checking his tablet.  “It’s the same area, at least.”

 Barry zipped into his suit and out, enroute to an armored truck heist with Cisco and Iris providing directions.

No rest for the wicked, or the Flash.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm hoping to get one more chapter out before Season 2 begins, but no promises.
> 
> And feel free to hit me up on [tumblr](http://lisellevelvet.tumblr.com).
> 
> And the dinner was roasted chicken with rosemary and sage, potato gratin, and salad of arugula, avocado, grape tomatoes, and a freshly made lemon-shallot vinaigrette.
> 
> (aka What I made for dinner last Friday)


	7. Progress is Overrated

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Unexpected visitors in the Lab make denial a whole lot more difficult.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AN: This chapter includes the use of a racial slur. Its inclusion does not reflect my personal views, or the view of the character that thinks it. I included it as an aspect of the implied past child abuse, which was emotional as well as physical.
> 
> Many thanks to Liu for the beta and coldflashtrash for her assistance.

Things began to fall into a pattern.  Not the one Len anticipated, but none of his plans ever ran smoothly once the Flash got involved.  

 Len tried to stay busy at S.T.A.R. Labs, but it wasn’t easy.  He, Lisa, and Mick didn’t have the opportunity to bring much with them and cooking only took up a limited amount of his time.  It also didn’t help that the place was practically deserted during the day.  He knew Ramon and Snow were around, but the scientists kept to their own labs, only venturing into the lounge for coffee or snacks.  Barry was around less than Len expected based on his research into the Flash; kid must not have been exaggerating about his workload at CCPD.

Mick took over grocery shopping without any trouble; unlike himself and Lisa, his friend didn’t have a huge target on his back.  It was also downright impressive how well the man could blend into a crowd when he wanted to.  Mick’s alias-themed proximity pass—in the shape of a flame wearing goggles—allowing the promised access to the facility.  Surprised the hell out of them the first time he tried it, expecting to be on lock-down after the confrontations that just…kept happening.

 At least the lounge TV had Netflix. Gave him _something_ to do besides sit and stare at a wall. And think.  Laptops got busted along with the guns.  At least Mick’s weapon wasn’t as badly damaged as his own.  Far as he knew, the engineer hadn’t fixed it yet.  

 Len was being cautious, unwilling to risk exposure so soon.  Lisa’s recovery was progressing well, although ribs were obnoxiously slow to heal.  He had to keep it together, be strong for her…but this whole situation had him more off balance than he was willing to admit.  Long-suppressed memories refusing to stay frozen; bringing the uncertainty, the tension, the anger to the surface. Even after nearly a decade.  Len’s hands balled into fists without his consent, just barely resisted the urge to punch the wall.  Didn’t need to go to Snow with more injuries, drawing attention to his weakness.    

 Lisa’s injuries, his own hands, served as a constant reminder of what _he…_ Len suppressed a shudder, _refusing_ to—took a deep breath, let it out slowly.

 As far as he knew, Barry hadn’t made any progress towards figuring out how that building came down.  Not that Len expected otherwise.  Couldn’t imagine the speedster potentially jeopardizing his career by focusing on what happened to Lisa at the expense of his other cases.  Doubted the kid thought of her as a priority.

 Len gave himself an internal shake.  Tried not to think like that, remind himself that it only happened four days ago and cops moved slowly…even if said badge was the Flash.  

 He barely saw the CSI since Sunday evening; kid looked exhausted during the few glimpses Len _did_ manage.  Quickly swung by Monday for the so-called Dinners of Doom—name a work in progress, according to Cisco—missed the meal entirely yesterday.  Blew into the building at 21:37 last night, only long enough to put on the Flash suit before he was off again.  Bound for somewhere.    

 Limped back in at 02:42, face cut up and left arm held awkwardly, shoulder obviously dislocated.  Snow had already left.  Mick bullied the kids—more Ramon than Barry—into letting him and Len pop it back into place.  Bind it properly before the Flash’s powers made surgery the only option.  At least it got one of his questions answered, painkillers don’t work on Flash, providing context for Dr. Snow’s apology.

* * *

 

It was his turn to make dinner, emerging from the lab they converted into a work space.  Not that they had much in it so far.  Needed to fix that, and soon, before they went stir-crazy.  Lisa might’ve mentioned talking to Snow about it, but he wasn’t sure.  Len was willing to acknowledge that he hadn’t been as…sharp as usual, since hearing about his father’s release.  

Hated how the man could _still_ do this to him, reduce him to the mentality of that scared kid, trying to keep the drunk bastard from finding him and Lisa, or, when that failed, making sure dear old dad’s attention was firmly on him.  Taking the hits so she wouldn’t.  Until he took the fucking cowards’ way out and left.  

 Len sighed.  This wasn’t helpful.  And he had dinner to make.  He smirked to himself.  He and Mick were enjoying showing off for the Flash and his friends.  Still couldn’t quite believe how much Scarlet put away.  And needed to scarf down those calorie bars on top of it.  

 He heard voices as he approached the lounge; four of them, Barry’s the only one he recognized.  Len tensed, anxiety ratcheting up, stopping him cold.   _Fuck._

 One thing he _knew_ about the Flash, banked on during their encounters, was that the kid didn’t exactly think things all the way through.  Len was pretty reasonably confident that whoever was in the other room wasn’t there to arrest him.  Or Lisa.  Or Mick.  But beyond that…damn kid trusted far too easily.  The fact that Len was standing in the hallway at S.T.A.R. Labs served as Exhibit A.  

Len squeezed his eyes shut, knuckles going white around the handle of his knife case.  He _needed_ to start prepping in the next three minutes in order to have everything ready when he said it would be.  Knew that his obsession with time and staying on schedule was a coping mechanism, a crutch.   _Knew_ he was relying on it a little too heavily but unable to stop.  Time never failed him, it was constant.  Maintaining a schedule meant that he functioned, served as proof that he was in control.  Strong and sure, not weak, not barely holding himself together.  

 He could control time; choose to stick to a schedule.  Practically the only thing he had any say over lately—having to be in such close quarters with his enemies, even if the Flash and his crew seemed to forget about that.  Lisa recovering, injured because of him.  Because he failed her once again, leaving like a coward instead of staying to protect her.

 And now…did he take the risk of revealing his presence, that the Rogues were in S.T.A.R. Labs to whoever Barry had in the other room?  Did he _really_ trust the kids’ judgement, because the men obviously knew about Barry’s side gig—the kid had no other reason to be in the facility, and his suit was visible from the Lounge.  

 Of course, Mick had to walk by while he was frozen in the hallway, gently bumping Len’s shoulder with his own.  “Just go in Frosty.  If Flash wanted that meet to be private, he would’ve picked a different room.”

 “So we what, trust his judgement?” Len shot back, at a loss.

“You’re the one that said we should go to him for protection.  If there’s one thing we both know about Flash, he takes that shit seriously.  Me ‘n you’ve used that against him enough, practically count on it during our encounters.”  His friend pointed out.  Len tilted his head, conceding the point.

 “I‘m sure Flash already told ‘em we were staying here.  To avoid surprises.”  Mick called over his shoulder, ducking into the room he claimed for the duration.     

 Mick had a point.  Len took a deep breath and pushed the door open. Walked in with confidence, heading straight for the counter as if he belonged.  

 The kid gave him a tired smile in greeting but didn’t pause his conversation.  None of the newcomers looked surprised by his presence; Len could feel their eyes on his back as he walked, an itch between his shoulder blades.  

 Len studied their reflection in the glass cabinet door, an unfamiliar and mismatched group.  Abercrombie type, the glare directed at Len promising hostility he probably couldn’t deliver, sharing the middle sofa with a man in his late fifties, early sixties, dictionary definition of a professor—complete with dark, square framed glasses.  Sprawled out on the middle couch, the one Len claimed whenever he was in the room, was a tall brunette that looked a whole lot like Ray Palmer.  But what would the Starling City billionaire care about S.T.A.R. Labs?  More to the point, how would he know Barry Allen?

 “So that’s it, the hand-over is official?”  Barry asked.  

 Len appreciated it, got the attention off him and maybe now he’d find out what was going on.

 “Yup, we’re all set.  I have the paperwork from the board right here, all it needs are signatures from Cisco and Caitlin.”  Palmer look-alike replied.

 **“** Don’t we need a witness that won’t be directly influenced by the changes to the articles?”  Abercrombie had a point, not that Len knew much about corporate law.  

 “Got it covered, Felicity agreed to witness virtually.”

 Since when did video conferencing qualify…?

 “Don’t worry; this is perfectly legal and fairly common practice with a project like this.  These are preliminary contracts and need to go back before the full board to approve the amendments we made this afternoon.  Hopefully this’ll be the last round of back and forth with these things.  If so, the entire board will ratify the contracts, and we’ll sign them with appropriate fanfare during the press conference.”  Not-Palmer continued, sounded like he’d given that explanation more than a few times.

“Why does it need to go back before the full board?  You, Caitlin, and Cisco have 70% control over the endowment.”  Barry questioned.  

 That was…an interesting development indeed.  Were they referring to S.T.A.R. Labs?

 “That is precisely _why_ it has to go before the Board of Directors again, Barry.  Along with Ronald, and myself, Caitlin and Cisco will be taking over as department heads.  Given how… _irregular_ everything has been over the past few months, this must follow proper procedure and be as transparent as possible.”  Professor was probably an accurate guess for the old guy.  

 Not-Palmer quickly picked things up from there..  “Anyway, the inspections will start tomorrow, and we’ll increase the obvious security measures first thing in the morning.  Press releases goes out on Monday, and I'll arrange a press conference—”

 “You mean Felicity will,” Barry cut in.  Len couldn’t see him in the reflection, but the grin in his voice was obvious.  

 The man actually stuck his tongue out at the kid.  “—once the inspectors finish and the Board approves the final version of the contracts.  That way it can be a big ceremonial event—yes, I know those suck, but they’re a necessary evil.”  He hurried on before anyone could comment.  “It will provide the opportunity to present our operational timeline, answer questions, reassure _everyone_ that we have no intention of reactivating the particle accelerator, and get the word out that we’ll be looking to hire again.  But enough with the boring stuff, everything’s been quiet here so far, right?  Even with the messy retrieval?”  

Len can’t quite suppress his scoff, deciding to use this opportunity to enter the conversation.  Needing some answers of his own.

 “Building’s still standing.  That’s gotta count for something,” he drawled, pulling his Cold persona around him like a shield.  

 Barry shot him an odd look but didn’t disagree with his assessment.  

 “Well, we haven’t killed each other yet.”  The speedster said with a chuckle.  “It’s been quiet here at the lab, Ray.  Too bad I can’t say the same about the rest of Central right now.  Cisco’s gone over all of the surveillance footage personally, and it’s constantly being run against facial recognition software to be on the safe side.”  

 The oldest member of the group cleared his throat quietly, giving the speedster a meaningful look over his glasses.  

 “Oh crap, right!  Introductions.  Len, this is Ray Palmer, Professor Martin Stein, and Ronnie Raymond, Caitlin’s husband.  Guys, this is—”

 Well, well, well, that explained a few things.  Raised a whole lot more questions, too…

 “Captain Cold.” Raymond spat.  His glare was impressive, though it fell far short of truly intimidating.  Len smirked.

 “While I appreciate my full title, Len will be fine.  Seeing as you are already in on Barry’s little secret.”  Len crossed his arms, meeting the other man’s hostility head on.

 What followed was tense, charged silence as they stared each other down.  Len’s indolent smirk clearly pissing the other man off even more.  

Barry finally spoke, ending the standoff after one hundred and fifty three seconds.  ”Do any of you want to stick around for dinner?”

 Bit presumptuous of the kid, since he wouldn’t be doing any of the actual cooking.  Len clenched his teeth, already behind schedule.  Making adjustments, calculations…

 “Sure, sounds fun.  But just me, Ronnie and Caitlin have plans, and Dr. Stein—”

 “Can speak for himself, Dr. Palmer.  I appreciate the offer but must decline, Barry.  The decision to advance the time frame to reopen S.T.A.R labs requires that I address the logistical concerns for my own research, and Clarissa already made reservations.”    

 “Not by that much.”  Barry shrugged.

 “No, but if the facility assessment and reclassification begins tomorrow I need to be present as the newly appointed director of S.T.A.R. Labs.”

 Wait.  What?  Len turned to face the men on the couch, holding his breath.

“Feds are coming here?  Tomorrow?”  He directed that to Barry, needing an answer, hoping he was mistaken.  

 “Yeah, to get S.T.A.R. Labs up and running again…well…minus the accelerator.  FEMA needs to come in, check everything else over and reclassify the site.  Once that’s done, I have a team of structural engineers selected to assess the damage and make recommendations to make the most of the facility, focusing on alternative uses for the pipeline.”  Palmer summarized, sounding far too cheerful by half.    

 Len grabbed the edge of the counter, hard.  To keep his hands from shaking.   

 “Appreciate the advanced notice, Red.”  He choked out, voice sounding raspy and strained to his own ears.  Eyes darting, searching for an excuse to leave, needing to get out of the lounge while he still could.  Refused, _refused_ to do this here.  

 “Forgot my steel,” came out, aimed nowhere in particular.  Forcing his legs to cross the room, into the hall, door shutting behind him.  Moving fast.

* * *

 

Made it back to his room…no, not his, part of the Lab, one more place he’d have to leave just as it was starting to feel safe.  Leaned heavily against the bench, trying to stay on his feet.  Gave up, his knees buckling.  Holding out long enough for Len to drop onto the air mattress.  

 Staring.  Fixated on the door handle, breathing fast and shallow, trying to stay silent.  Didn’t work.  Panting harsh, bouncing off the walls of the all-too-empty room.  Heart beating out of his chest.  

 Len swallowed hard, covering his face with an arm.  Too loud.   _He_ will hear.  Always heard.  Laughed at his fear, mocked him.  Hit harder.   _Fuck_ where was Lisa?  Had to get to her, protect her, make sure—make sure _he_ wouldn’t target Lisa instead.  

 Tried to get his legs to listen, to move.  Grimacing when he had no luck.  Hands balled into fists, knuckles white.  Nails digging in.  Needing the pain, had to focus.  Breathing finally, _finally_ starting to slow—Oh shit. No.

 No no no no.  Not now.  Willing the knob to stop turning.  Should’ve locked it.  Even if it made _him_ even more angry.  Would’ve bought him time—

 Len watched the door slowly swing open, unable to do more than stare, mind racing, screaming, trying to get his body to listen.  Had to hide.  Couldn’t even look around to find somewhere…

 “Len?”  

 Wait.  Wait, that wasn’t right.  Something wasn’t—the voice.  It was all wrong.  Quiet, soft, _concerned_.   _He_ was never any of those things.  Never bothered with his name, used ‘boy’ or ‘brat’ if he was lucky; ‘mud’ or worse if he wasn’t.   Who…?

 Len couldn’t breathe, held his breath, nails digging in harder.   _Willing_ his eyes to focus, needing to know.  Pulse thrumming loudly in his ears, vision tunneling, hyper focused between the black dots.  Revealing Barry Allen, cautiously entering the room.

 That…made no sense.  Why would Flash—?

Kid’s eyes went wide, closed the door as quickly and softly as he could, materializing right in front of him, crouching on the floor, hands covering Len’s fists.  Hazel eyes searching his face.  

“How can I help? “

 “Can’t—ca…”

 “Breathing?”

 He managed a jerky nod.  

 Barry moved slowly, careful not to surprise him, kneeling behind Len on the air mattress.  Guided Len’s arms so one fist rested high on his own chest, the other closer to his stomach, the kids’ hands keeping his in place.

 “Ok, exhale with me on a four count, nice and deep…through your mouth.  Inhale on another four count through your nose, then we’ll hold for another four…work our way up to seven.”  

 Len gave another sharp nod.  The brunette squeezed his hands, began counting.  

 He had no idea how long they sat there, how long Barry held him.  Len was leaning into the speedster about two repetitions into the five-count.  Fists unclenching, fingers lacing together, Barry took that as the signal to increase from six to seven.  Stopped counting when Len—when _they_ —managed ten repetitions, but didn’t move away.

 Len was freezing, drenched in sweat and shivering, but finally in control of himself.  Mostly.  He heaved a sigh, leaning into Barry a little bit more, absorbing warmth.

 “I know this is a dumb question, but maybe it’d help to talk about it?”  Barry moved a little, shifting like he was getting ready to pull away.  Len’s heart rate spiked a little and he tightened his grip on the kid’s hands, needing the contact.  Not knowing how to ask.

 Barry squeezed back, arms tightening.  

 They sat that way for another three hundred and twelve seconds.  He relaxed a bit more, sense of time restored.  Took another deep breath, let it out slowly.

 Shook his head slightly, as much as he could from its resting place on Barry’s shoulder.  “Don’t want to; probably should.”

 Scarlet squeezed his hands again.  Len squeezed back.  

 “Owe it to you, I suppose, since it’s twice now.”

 Barry shook his head.  “You don’t owe me anything, Len.  Not for this.”  He paused, choosing his next words carefully.  “But it would help if I knew…if you would share the triggers.  So we could avoid them.”

 His laugh was short, harsh, completely devoid of humor.  “Oh Scarlet, if only it were that simple.”

 The silence hung between them.  Surrounding them like a down comforter, warm and soft.  Making the cold bearable.  Five more minutes trickle by and Barry shifted a bit more. It occurred to Len that this was the longest he’d ever seen the kid be still.

 “Mind if we scoot back against the wall?  I need to stretch my legs out.” Barry asked, voice soft and soothing.

 Len nodded, didn’t speak, appreciated how the kids’ arms tightened around him once more before relaxing so they could move.  

 Not that they go far, sliding back on the mattress to lean against the wall, sides pressed together, legs stretched out in front of them.  Barry snuck an arm around his waist before he could settle in, limb trapped between him and the wall.  Can’t be comfortable, but it helped. And Len was too selfish, too drained to suggest the kid move it away.

 Len appreciated the gesture, the contact, the warmth.  Hadn’t noticed how tactile the other was before, not that the game they played offered the opportunity for that kind of observation.  Found it odd, how comfortable this was, all things considered.  Len…did not handle physical contact well.  Notable exception to that rule was Lisa.  Mick didn’t set him off either; not that the pyromaniac was the touchy-feely type.  

 He learned early on that an outstretched arm lead to a blow far more often than a hug, from the very man that triggered this latest breakdown.  If only Len could get that miserable bastard out of his head.  Finally be free of his shadow.  

 That wasn’t to say that Len didn’t _crave_ contact.  Just…didn’t—couldn’t—trust enough to ask for it.  Lovers were rare at best, his lifestyle and hang-ups not helping. Even one-night-stand’s were few and far between.

 Len didn’t understand why Barry’s touch didn’t set him off, but he wasn’t going to question it.  The kid was just fundamentally _good_ —the exception that proved the rule.  He screwed up from time to time, but…

 Len knew Scarlet would never use any of this against him. Just like he was certain that the Flash holding Lisa’s gold gun to her head at the Santini casino was a completely empty threat.  Under different circumstances, the irony of having so much trust in someone he considered an enemy would be absolutely hilarious.

 He took one more breath—exhale for seven, inhale for seven, hold for seven—Barry’s arm tightening around his waist.  Gathering his thoughts.

 “I—it may be easier if you just ask me questions, Scarlet.  Don’t know how or where to begin.”

 “Ok…what triggered you just now, in the lounge?”

 “You—we need to clear out tonight, right?  If feds are going to be-”  Paused.  Forced himself to breathe.  “Crawling all over the place.  Can’t exactly have three very wanted criminals wandering the facility.  Thirteen hours is not enough time to—” organize, plan.  Stay alive.  Len glared down at his hands, nearly missed the kid’s sigh.

 “What?  No, Len.  Why do you keep assuming…?  Look, I meant what I said when I called you back Saturday night.  That you three could stay here as long as you guys didn’t try to attack us and didn’t try to break into the Cortex.Nothing’s changed.  Yeah, we’ve shouted at each other.  But I _expected_ that to happen.  There’s too much crap built up…plus awkward, tense, probably boring…and I don’t know where I’m going with this.”  He trailed off with a laugh.     

 “Alright, so the point I was trying to make is that these rooms are yours for as long as it takes.  And unless we completely ignore each other, we’re gonna argue.  If I was gonna throw you guys out because we disagreed?  That wouldn’t be fair at all, we never would’ve let you stay in the first place…If other stuff comes up with the Lab situation…I’ll let you know, ok?”  

 Now it was Len’s turn to sigh.  Could tell the speedster was confused…didn’t exactly blame him.  Despite whatever happened when he was eleven, West clearly cared for the kid and provided a safe, stable home.  “A…reliable place to stay has never been a given for me, Barry…” he trailed off, shrugging.     

 The brunette stayed silent for longer than Len expected.  “Ok, well…Let’s look at this from a different angle, then.  Do you know how much _easier_ it would’ve been for us to just lock you into a suite?”

 Barry didn’t wait for a response, pausing long enough to allow what he said to sink in before continuing.  

“It would’ve taken maybe ten minutes, probably a whole lot less.  Five to sort out where, the remaining five to get the couches and clothes and stuff.  Cisco can lock portions of the building off in seconds.”

 Len…hadn’t looked at it like that.  

 “Instead…” Barry prompted.

 Len humored him, familiar with the technique. “Took you nearly an hour to call.  Chose an area that was close but not too close, easy to separate.  Gave us access to the garage **.** Cisco took the time to make passes to match the aliases.”  Smiled, barely.  

 “Yeah.  Of course he did, Cisco's probably even more committed to the names than you are.”

 “Message received, Scarlet.  You aren’t throwing us out.  Doesn’t suddenly make me, Lisa, and Mick invisible to the feds.”

 “First of all, it’s FEMA, not the FBI.  They’re not exactly a poster-agency for observational skills.”

 That surprised a laugh out of him, Barry grinned in response.

 “More importantly, they inspected the Cortex level nearly a month ago.  Believe me, we’d be panicking too if we had to get all of the Flash stuff…and some of Cisco’s other work…out and hidden by tomorrow morning.” Nudged Len’s shoulder with his own then froze.  Words clearly catching up to him.

Len waved a hand before the kid could start falling all over himself with apologies.  

 “For real, it was a pain in the ass to move all the Flash stuff around on such short notice—and we had three days’ worth, because sometimes Ray really fails at mentioning important things.  Even worse, it took the damn inspectors a week and a half to go over what little was actually left.  And it was just our luck that Grodd decided to resurface during the middle of it.”

“Grodd?”

 “Giant telepathic gorilla with some pretty serious anger management issues.  And a hatred of bananas.”  The kid replied, like there was nothing completely insane about what he just described.  

 Len tried to come up with something, anything, in response.  After forty-two seconds of failure on that count, he decided to follow up later.

 “Never mind, I’ll explain about him later.  And yes, before you ask, I do know _exactly_ how crazy that sounded.”

 Why did you come to me?”  Barry asked, getting serious once more.

 “You already know why, kid.  I had no other options.”

 Barry scoffed.  “Bullshit.  You three could’ve easily gotten out of town.”

 Len tilted his head in acknowledgement, leaning against the kid so much he could almost use the other’s shoulder as a pillow.  

 “Fine.  Because you care, Barry.  You protect people.  Pull punches even when your enemies don’t.  Something I appreciate, by the way.”  Glanced over at his nemesis, smirking.  Although it felt more like a smile.  Barry shook his head and smiled.  Looked like he was trying to resist the urge to snark back.  

 “Because…because I knew you’d agree.  Even when every other person, sane or not, would’ve told me where to shove it.  Know you won’t sell us out.”  Len muttered, feeling completely, horribly exposed.

 He fell silent.  Barry let him, hazel eyes curious, somehow knowing he wasn’t done.  When did the kid learn how to read him so well?  

Len continued, words barely more than a breath.  “Hoped you’d help us sort this out.  And…I knew that…if you said yes, came up with something…Lisa’d be safe.”

 “Yeah.  You Rogues may annoy the crap out of me, well, us…But I suppose I’d miss you if you were gone.”

“You mean dead, kid.”  No sense pulling punches.

 “It really is that serious?”

 Len nodded, swallowing hard.  

 “Why—how could your own father hate you that much?” His voice was small, confused.  So incredibly sad.  

 Something about the kid’s tone, full of empathy—for _Len_ of all people—pulled an honest response too quick to censor.  

“I’ve spent my whole life trying to figure that one out, Barry.”  

 Barry tightened the arm around Len’s waist even more, hugging him.  He turned enough to free his right arm, draping it over Barry’s shoulder and returning the gesture.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, I hope this chapter works.
> 
> For the sake of clarity, I'm writing from the perspective of different characters rather than as a separate narrator, there will be times (like this) where something sneaks up on them without much warning. 
> 
> In this case, Len is very good at suppressing and ignoring things until he can't any longer. At which point the issue explodes without a whole lot of warning--from his perspective, since he's ignoring warning signs. I sprinkled in a bunch of hints that we were building to something like this, but since Len is in denial mode he doesn't pay as much attention as he should.


	8. Trust but Verify...or just Verify

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long everyone, they weren't being very cooperative. Hopefully this was worth the wait. MASSIVE thanks to Crimson and Liu for their assistance!

Barry had no idea how long he and Len sat there in the dark. He glanced around the empty lab space; aside from the air mattress they were sitting on and a pair of boots by the door, the room looked deserted. Now that he thought about it and had a chance to look around, it wasn’t all that surprising that Len had a hard time believing he could stay as long as he needed. They should be able to change that now, though.

 He closed his eyes, head resting against the wall. Barry hoped Len would open up a little more after the revelation about his father, but it didn’t happen. And Barry wasn’t going to push.

 Len squeezed his shoulder.

“Hmm?”

 “Shall we rejoin the others, Scarlet? I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.”

 Barry nodded. He was almost always hungry. “Sounds good to me.”

 They untangled themselves and got up, Len heading for the door almost immediately.

 “One sec...Look, I’m not...I just.” He bit his lip. “If you ever want to talk, or need someone to listen…”

 “Thanks, kid.” Len paused with his hand on the doorknob.

 His expression made it clear that he’d probably never take Barry up on that offer, but it wasn’t a complete dismissal like before. The speedster decided to count that as a victory of sorts, following the older man out into the hall, walking towards the lounge. Things were definitely changing.

 Barry’s mind was spinning, trying to process what he learned. Not that Len said a whole lot, at least not aloud. But his body language, the way he actually leaned into Barry, didn’t want him to move away...was loud and clear.

 Now that he thought about it, Len did the same thing in the alleyway. Granted, he resisted at first but then nearly collapsed. It was very different from his reaction in Saints and Sinners, where he practically snarled at Barry for grabbing his arm.

 The sound of voices brought Barry out of his thoughts. He wasn’t surprised that Len moved to put as much space between them as possible, after what happened. This whole situation—living at STAR Labs, choosing to go to them for help—put Cold at something he perceived to be a serious disadvantage. And if there was one thing Barry was certain that Leonard Snart hated, it was being in a position of weakness. Not that Barry and his friends would ever exploit something like this, but...it was pretty damn obvious that they were a glaring exception in the Rogues’ lives.

 Shit. He was glad he hadn’t been able to see Len’s face when he blurted out that question about the man’s father. His _voice_ sounded so rough, so broken, so subdued. Brutally honest, a little surprised, too. As though not even Len realized the truth of what he said until he heard it out loud.

 Barry slowed down even further, watching Len pause and square his shoulders before entering the lounge. The second the door closed, a large hand landed on his arm.

 “You ‘n me need to talk, Flash. Now.”

 Barry sighed. “Ok, talk.”

 “Someplace _private_ ,” Rory stressed, looking at Barry like he was an idiot.

 He rolled his eyes, grabbing the pyromaniac and zipping them into the treadmill room. He didn’t want to use Len’s space, or risk invading Lisa’s—one in three odds were still too high for him to be willing to chance it.

Rory stumbled slightly when Barry put him down, quickly composing himself. He was trying to look intimidating: arms crossed, feet planted, and glaring down at the speedster. Barry scoffed quietly at the display, dropping to sit on the edge of the treadmill. It wasn’t like the other man posed much of a risk at the moment. He could look as physically imposing as he wanted—they _both_ knew that he didn’t actually stand a chance right now. Not without his gun. Barry’s decision to phase him into the room proved that without a doubt...and it gave him another opportunity to practice phasing with another person.

 The other day with Len was his first attempt. He, Caitlin, and Cisco agreed it was a little too risky to play with, but since he hadn’t seen any alternative that didn’t put them in even more danger…

 Rory cleared his throat. Right, he was supposed to be intimidated.

 Barry waved a hand. “Somewhere private, as requested. What?”

 “Don’t even think about using any of that against Len. Got it?”

 Barry had no idea where the hell this was coming from. “Or?”

 “You mess with my friends, don’t be surprised if yours go up in flames.”

 Barry scoffed. “Not very creative. Besides, where would that leave Cold and Glider?”

 Heat Wave stalked forward faster than Barry expected, grabbing his collar and lifting him like he weighed next to nothing. “Gimme a reason, Flash. You use this or toss ‘em out on the streets ‘n I’ll do much worse than make threats.”

 Well, that answered one of his questions. Rory was more partner and friend than gang member or accomplice to the other two. Barry got that the pyro was just looking out for the siblings, but using personal details as leverage was more the Rogues’ style.

 Still didn’t give him the right to _assume_ Barry would tell people, or use what happened as blackmail. He easily broke the other man’s hold on him, dropping to his feet. Pissed.

 “Fuck you. I’d _NEVER_ use that against anyone, no matter who they are or what they’ve done. You think he’s the only one to get panic attacks?! We may not be on the same side, or see eye to eye about pretty much anything, but there’s no way I would use anything I learned while getting someone through something like that against them. EVER.”

 Barry paced the length of the room, hands laced behind his head. “Look, the only way I’d kick you guys out at this point is if you physically attack my friends. How many times do I have to keep repeating that?!”

 Rory looked...less shocked than Barry expected. Practically _thoughtful._

 “You’ve had ‘em.” It wasn’t a question, but Barry nodded anyway.

 “Explains how you knew what to do,” Rory paused, tension leaving his shoulders. Barry decided to wait him out, not entirely sure what caused his demeanor to change.

 “Happened to you. Someone you trusted took something you told ‘em, somethin’ important, and used it against you.”

 Barry couldn’t cover his surprise. How did…?

 “The way you said it, kid. You never bothered with any ‘not that kind of person’ bullshit, skipped straight over indignant to pissed off and betrayed.”

 Shit. He was right.

 Barry let out a humorless laugh. “Yeah. Yeah, you could say that. It was my psychiatrist. After...everything with my mom and dad, moving in with Joe...one of the conditions was counseling. Iris...god, for the longest time, ‘til last year, actually, she was the only one that believed me.” He shook his head, rubbing the back of his neck. “I actually...didn’t mind that doctor. She...seemed to believe me, too. Which was a nice change. Helped with the anxiety. Everyone insisting I was wrong, or crazy. Just making it up because I couldn’t accept that my father murdered my mother. The worst part is that I couldn’t really blame them. Until the accelerator. Who’d believe people could move faster than sound, be surrounded by yellow...or red...lightning? But I _knew_ what I saw. How much Mom and Dad loved each other. KNEW that he didn’t do it.

 “She was friends with the ADA that went after my dad. They were _this_ close to getting me locked in a psych ward. Still don’t know why or what they were hoping to get out of it.” He jumped up on the treadmill and looked down at the other man. Rory just raised an eyebrow, silently encouraging him to continue. Barry never imagined the pyro would be such a good listener.

 “Unless I admitted that I’d been lying since that night. But I wasn’t, dammit. Even Joe knows that now...not that it’ll do any good. Wells is gone, and Dad will be stuck in Iron Heights because—” he cut himself off.

 “The whole thing was so fucked up. It had me so anxious because I didn’t know if Joe was involved or not...finally it all boiled over.” Barry rubbed his arms, crossing them.

 “Iris found me, got Joe when she couldn’t get me calmed down. Took a few more panic attacks before I finally told him what was going on...he got the doctor’s license pulled, the courts to drop the mandatory counseling and we basically agreed not to talk about it. Until I woke up from my coma, anyway.”

 Barry rubbed a hand over his face, glancing up. Oh fuck. He covered his mouth. Not that it mattered _now_. God, had he really just...?

 Going by the completely dumbfounded expression on Rory’s face, he had.

 “Never woulda guessed a superhero’d get it, kid. ‘m impressed, most people can’t come outta somethin’ like that and have a normal life. Takes guts.”

 Barry...wasn’t sure what to say to that. To any of it.

 “How’d you get a job with CCPD? Hell, _why_ did you get a job as a badge?”

 “Records are sealed, our captain helped Joe go after that doctor in the first place...pretty sure Felicity erased the records by now. So even if someone knew what happened or where to look, they wouldn’t find anything.”

 “Damn, kid.”

 “Yeah, that about sums it up. Satisfied?”

 Rory snorted. “We’re good. And I never heard any of that.”

 That surprised a small smile out of him. “Ok. Thanks...Mick.”

 The pyromaniac clapped him on the shoulder, making him stumble slightly.

 “Don’t mention it.”

* * *

Barry headed straight for the takeout as soon as he and Mick entered the lounge. Hopefully calories would get rid of his headache, much more comfortable blaming it on low blood sugar than the tension of the last few hours.

 He caught Len’s gaze a few times. The speedster thought he detected some relief amid the curiosity and apprehension. Barry made eye contact and gave Len a small, deliberate nod. Trying to reassure him, let him know that Barry would not betray his confidence. Len nodded back, a small, sincere smile flitting across his face so quickly that anyone other than the speedster probably would have missed it.

 Barry sat on the edge of the table with his second plate of food, finally paying attention to the conversation going on around him.

“This is awesome, now you guys can finally order stuff and have it delivered without it being super conspicuous.” Cisco enthused, blushing when Lisa smiled at him.

 “Does that include real mattresses?” Lisa asked.

 “Not unless you guys are good with twins,” Ray answered, glancing around at the Rogues. ”Yeah, I know those suck. But we can do bigger futons and sofa-beds with the air mattress toppers so they’re comfortable. Let me know what you end up deciding on and I’ll put in the order.”

 “That won’t be necessary.” Len cut in.

 “Are you planning on moving furniture out when you guys get your situation sorted?”Ray didn’t bother waiting for a response. “Exactly. This way it’s stuff that we can rearrange in STAR once you’re done with it. Scientists _always_ need places to crash, but having anything larger than a twin-sized mattress would draw attention. Sleeper-sofas and futons, though? Totally wouldn’t get a second glance.

 “No need to decide now, Cisco’s got my email, or you can let Professor Stein know what you pick out.” Ray said, getting to his feet. “But I need to get back to Starling. This was more fun than I expected.”

 “That’s one way to put it,” Barry said with a smile, getting up to walk Ray out. He barely took a step before his phone rang. So much for his evening.

 “Captain Singh…?”

 “Allen, there’s been another collapse.”

Shit.

* * *

This time the building in question was an entire warehouse.

 Barry saw a lot of destruction since becoming the Flash. Collateral damage from his fights, the singularity ripping through downtown—he remembered that, even if no one else did. But this? The entire structure imploded. Even master-demolitionists had a hard time making a building disappear so completely and so neatly. Nothing else was even touched, not by debris or by...whatever brought the building tumbling down.

 Cleanup was well underway at the site of the safe-house before Barry got a chance to see it in person, and photographs were only as helpful as the person taking them. Not that he had anything against Fisher, she was extremely thorough and nearly as unconventional as he was, but she had the tendency to get caught up on a theory. Focusing on that conclusion until proven wrong, steering the focus of her analysis. She also didn’t have the benefit of constantly going up against meta humans to expand her frame of reference.

 As such, her focus at the safe-house was collecting samples to analyze for explosives...to be fair, the safe house was burning by the time his colleagues arrived. Barry, on the other hand, had a different perspective.

 The response to this site was much faster. No fire, for one. Barry traversed the scene, trying to determine if there was a point of impact. He let time dilate around him, expanding his senses and ability to process while still appearing to move at a normal pace, weaving in and out of his colleagues, the fire department, and a couple very obnoxious bystanders. He sighed, running a hand through his hair and raising his camera.

 “Anything yet, Bear?”

 He gave Joe a strained smile. “No. I can’t figure out why the building collapsed, either material failure or some sort of outside influence. Usually there’s some kind of directionality to be found.” Barry looked around quickly, his voice dropping to a whisper. “Even when Len froze the door to the Customs garage and broke it. The door shattered, but there were marks to indicate where the force came from.

 “With this? Nothing. Not that I expected much of the concrete. The steel beams and rebar should have something, but…” he shrugged. “The only thing that I can think of that was even a little bit similar was the glass at Wells’ place when Piper went after him.”

 “You think Rathaway could’ve done this?” Joe asked, eyebrows going up.

 “I dunno, it’s possible? But my first instinct says ‘no’.”

 “What makes you say—Captain Singh.”

 “Joe. Allen, anything yet?”

 “Not really, sir. No sign of explosives that I’ve found so far. I’ll run tests on the materials to ensure they’re all up to code, but so far there’s nothing that jumps out at me. Have the others found anything?” Barry asked.

 Singh shook his head. “Nothing so far.”

 “Sir...could I. Um, would it be possible to bring in STAR Labs to help? They’ve got much more sensitive equipment at their disposal and—”

 His boss sighed heavily. “If it were just up to me, yes. But the commissioner is getting involved now, and there’s no way he’d grant approval right now. He’s holding a press conference in the morning to discuss the escalating mob war. This site is on the outskirts of Darbinyan territory and I get the feeling that he intends to pin this on the Santinis.”

 “But that’s—”

 “Just going to escalate things even further. I know, Allen, I know. That’s what happens when politics trump all else. Ask me again in a day or two, when you’ve had a chance to begin your analyses.”

 Barry nodded with a sigh of his own. Of course, he could still have Cisco check any of the numerous monitoring they set up all over Central for anything odd. Maybe if he ran this area’s readouts against the safe-house they’d find somewhere to begin. In the meantime, he had a job to do.

* * *

Cisco was bored. Bored, bored, bored. Barry’s work schedule meant _way_ less time for Flash stuff this week, and he was kinda stuck on all of his ongoing projects. Ish. He had ideas and concepts in mind, but it was very difficult to run the necessary tests with FEMA crawling all over the pipeline, and their resident meta MIA. Barry was going to help him test the different containment prototypes he built, with Iris and Caitlin on standby, but...yeah. And with no one else to assist with testing, he was at a standstill.

 He had come up with some pretty sweet modifications for the heat, cold, and gold guns respectively. Ways to adjust their settings, potentially reverse the damage, and improve overall operating efficiency. But Cisco wasn’t convinced that he should fix the weapons at all; the Rogues sure as hell hadn’t done anything to convince him that he should put in the effort.

 At least checking the interior surveillance footage gave him _something_ to do. Not that the Rogues got up to much. Other than Heat Wave, who left to get groceries (or whatever, but he always returned with more food), the other two spent most of their time in the lounge or labs they claimed for their own. So not helping with his boredom.

 Although...they were weird Wednesday night. Like, weirder than usual. Barry and Cold disappeared for ages...hmm. Anything that had those two talking for so long was probably Flash-related, and as a member of Team Flash...oh wow. Damn.

 He reached for the intercom, checking to make sure it was set for the cortex level only. “Hey Caitlin, can you come to my workshop? Like, now...if you’re not in the middle of something.”

 “Do I need to bring the first aid kit again?” Came back over the speakers.

 “No, you do not. And thank you for that vote of confidence.”

 “You’re welcome.” He could _hear_ her smile. “I’m in the lounge...want anything?”

 He could go for some popcorn...but that’d probably be in pretty bad taste, considering what he had a feeling they’d see on the footage.

 “No, I’m good for now.”

 His phone rang, Dig’s number on the caller ID.

 “Hey, man, what’s up?”

 “I think we need to make some changes to my suit.”

 “You better not say cape. I categorically refuse to incorporate capes.”

 Dig laughed at that. “No, not interested in a choking hazard. Lyla thinks we need to come up with something else as an identity concealer, she’s worried that a mask doesn’t do enough. And it provides no protection”

 That was a fair point, not that Oliver’s hood or Barry’s cowl did a hell of a lot of good as far as avoiding head injuries went. “Okay...so you’re thinking what? A helmet or something? Because that could happen.”

 “A helmet would be good.”

 “Ok, I’ll send over some concept sketches. Ray can do the measurements, he’s familiar enough with the process from his own suit.”

 “Thanks, Cisco.”

 “Wait, before you go, man. You need a code name!”

 “Cisco…”

 “Don’t tell me you already came up with something. That’s _my_ thing!”

 Laughter filtered over the intercom...and it wasn’t just Caitlin’s. Crap. He quickly turned the mic off. He didn’t _think_ he said the other man’s name over the course of their conversation, but why hadn’t Caitlin said something?

 “I don’t need a name, Cisco.”

 “Everybody needs a cool alias—”

 “Not true. But I need to go.”

 “K, Dig. I’ll send the concepts along in the next few days.”

 “Thanks.”

 The sound of Caitlin’s heels echoing in the hallway prevented him from getting sidetracked.

 “So what couldn’t wait?”

 “You’re gonna want a chair for this. You know how Barry and Cold were acting strange on Wednesday?”

 “You mean date night with Ronnie? No, no I don’t.”

 “Oh, right. Well Barry and Cold were all—”

 “Yes, I got that part. I’m guessing you went snooping in the surveillance footage to find out why?”

 “Obviously. I didn’t get very far, figured you should take a look, too.” Cisco told her, rewinding the feed.

 “He...does not look good.” Caitlin muttered. She was right, Cold was pale, visibly shaking and hyperventilating.

 “Yeah, I know. After a few minutes of this I figured you should see this, too.”

 They watched Barry enter the room.

 “I have no idea how Barry knew what was happening with Cold.” Cisco watched the lounge angle as well, and could not figure it out.

 “I’m not...oh. He’s obviously familiar with anxiety attacks.” Caitlin remarked.

 “What makes you say that?”

 “The breathing technique—grounding Snart and offering physical support. See his hands? That provides haptic feedback, proving to the person panicking that they are breathing and encouraging deeper breaths. The goal is to have the lower hand move more than the upper, ensuring that air fills the lungs and transitioning away from fast, shallow breathing that easily turns into hyperventilation.” Caitlin explained.

 “Looks like it worked,” Cisco observed, increasing the volume.

 “Interesting. Snart did the same thing after the ambush, assumed we’d make them leave.”

 He hit pause, turning to look at Caitlin. “When?”

 “When Barry took him to go get the guns. They were ambushed. Barry and I weren’t exactly thrilled that Snart neglected to mention that walking into a trap was a very real possibility. Something he pointed out loudly upon their return.”

 “Please, when did we ever expect them to be up-front with us from the start?” Cisco scoffed, hitting ‘play’.

 “Exactly.”  

 “Yeah, I’m still not sure why we didn’t just lock them in,” he griped.

 “You know why not.” Caitlin said.

 “Yeah, yeah. It’s not a quick fix, and there’s no way we would’ve told them to leave after seeing what happened to Lisa. And my gun.”

 He didn’t have to look at Caitlin to know she rolled her eyes at him for that.

 Cisco paused the feed. He and Caitlin stared at each other, then the screen, displaying Barry and Cold...Leonard?...not-quite-hugging.

 Cisco wasn’t sure about Caitlin, but he was having a hard time reconciling the nefarious Rogue that kidnapped them, forced him to give up Barry’s identity, iced Dante’s hand, with the man on the screen. He sounded so honest, looking exhausted and...Cisco couldn't quite put his finger on exactly what it was, but either way it changed things.  

 “Well, shit.”

 Caitlin just nodded at that, pursing her lips. “That…”

 “Makes it really hard to keep hating him?” Cisco finished her thought.

 “Something like that. It explains why Barry was all for helping them. If Snart looked even a fraction as bad as he does here…” She fell silent, waving a hand at the monitor.

 “My family isn’t all unicorns and rainbows, but…” Cisco shrugged.

 Caitlin merely nodded, taking a gulp of her neglected coffee.

 “Should we keep going?”

 “Might as well.”

 Cisco nudged the speed up to 1.5x when it was clear that Barry and Snart were done saying anything important. They watched the two men finally get up and leave the room. He changed the feed to the cameras in the hallway, following them. Caitlin shifted, getting ready to leave.

 “Hang on. Barry and Heat Wave ended up joining the rest of —ah.” Cisco hit pause. “There. They didn’t join us for a while, and came in from the cortex side.”

 He opened up more views, muttering under his breath. “I know they weren’t in the main room...and he wouldn’t have used your lab, or come in here, since Oliver’s suit is...let’s see. Oh, there.” Cisco pulled up the camera from the treadmill room. He couldn’t stop himself from snickering at the look on Heat Wave’s face when Barry put him down.

 The threats came as no surprise, but—

 “Whoa.” Barry was a lot angrier at that than Cisco expected. Caitlin nodded, both eyebrows halfway up her forehead.

 “Wait, rewind a little and make it louder,” she requested.

 “Holy crap. How…?” Cisco fell silent, listening to his friend’s explosion.

 This time Caitlin was the one to pause the feed.

 “Why didn’t he tell us?” Cisco exclaimed, a little hurt.

 “It does make sense. Barry has always been secretive, especially about things that really matter to him.”

 “But he sucks at lying.” Cisco felt compelled to point out.

 “Unless he’s had a lot of time to rehearse it, yes. But he never volunteers information, either. Remember when he repeated a day? You got kidnapped by the Rogues instead of allowing Mardon to hit Central with a tsunami. It was a completely moot point and he still didn’t bring it up for months. He probably never would have mentioned it, if not for everything that happened with Wells.” Caitlin pointed out.

 “This is just another thing that he probably thought we’d never believe, and it hasn’t been relevant. It still isn't, at least not for us. The only reason he said anything at all was because Rory hit too close to what happened for Barry to come up with any other response.”

 “I guess so. Plus, it’s not something that either Joe or Iris would ever tell us about, unless we one hundred percent needed to know.” Cisco said with a frown.

 “Exactly.”

 He heaved a sigh. “So now what?”

 “I think we should make sure that Barry was right about his records. Then either delete the footage—all of it—or sequester it on one of our personal servers. That way no one else will be able to find it without a lot of effort. Regardless of how we feel about Snart, he does not deserve to have this held over his head or used against him. I don’t feel right leaving it in the main archive for anyone to find...either that or Barry’s...revelations.”

 Cisco nodded. “I’ll sequester it, then.”

 Caitlin gave him one of her most judgmental looks.

 “In case I need to remind myself that Captain Cold is human after all.” He said with a humorless smile. His hands were already in motion, making sure to cover his tracks. Hmm...might as well take this opportunity to create a separate directory for all of the footage from the cortex level while he was at it. They did _not_ need some random third party stumbling across any of what happened here. Between the Flash stuff, having Rogues in residence...better safe than sorry.

 Everything that happened lately made it impossible to see them as comic book villains any longer, but that didn't mean he trusted them.

 “Ok, done. Now what?” He asked.

 “Hmm?” Caitlin swiveled her chair to face him.

 “Well...how do we tell Barry we know?”

 She bit her lip at that. “I’m not sure. If he asks, of course we’ll tell him. But maybe give it a day or two so we can figure out _how_ to tell him? He knows about the cameras, and that we review the footage.” She shrugged.

 He nodded, then groaned.

 “What?”

 “It’s weird seeing them as real people...suppose this means we should probably be making an effort.” Cisco might be whining.

 “No need to hurt yourself.”

 Cisco rolled his eyes. “Wasn’t planning to go out of my way or anything. But I should probably stop making Barry play Switzerland all the time. They still have a long way to go before I give the guns back, though.”

 “I thought they needed to be fixed first, Cisco.”

 “Yeah. But that won’t take too long. Then I can start _improving_ them.”

 Caitlin just laughed and shook her head at him, getting up. “Why did I even ask?”


End file.
